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Entrance to Makble C ave. 

Page 25. 



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AVE Regions 



0zARKSi2s Black Hills 



^, 



LUELLA AGNES OWEN. 



m 



Membre titulaire de la Societe de Speleologie^ and 
Fellow of the American Q-eographical Society. 



CINCINNATI. 

THE EDITOR PUBLISHING CO. 

1898. 



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copteighted 
The Editor Publishing Company. 




1893. 



^.^AO OF CO//G^.;^ 
\> OFFIGC OF THE ""^^ 

63770 OCT 31 1898 



V?---.- 



:;?>i<^^' 



MY MOTHER 

THIS BOOK IS AFFECTIONATELY 

DEDICATED. 



CONTENTS. 



OHAPTEB. 




PAGE, 


I 


A General View - - - 


1 


II 


Marble Cave 


25 


III 


Marble Cave Continued 


43 


IV 


Fairy Cave and Powell Cave - 


58 


V 


Other Stone County Caves - 


- 73 


VI 


Oregon County Caves 


82 


VII 


The Grand Gulf 


96 


VIII 


The Black Hills and Bad Lands 


103 


IX 


Wind Cave - - - - 


113 


X 


"Wind Cave Continued 


127 


XI 


u u u _ _ 


141 


XII 


" Concluded 


151 


XIII 


The Onyx Caves - - - 


162 


XIV 


Crystal Cave - - 


175 


XV 


" " Concluded 


183 


XVI 


Conclusion - - - - 


211 



Caye Regions of 

THE OZARKSAND BLACK HILLS. 



CHAPTER I. 

A G-ENEKAL VIEW. 

" O'er mountains bright with snow and light, 

We crystal hunters speed, along, 

While grots, and caves, and icy waves. 

Each instant echo to our song; 

And when we meet with stores of gems 

We grudge not kings their diadems." 

— Thomas Moore. 

The southern half of the State of Missouri, 
and the Black Hills of South Dakota, offer 
exceptionally delightful regions for the study of 
caves, or Speleology as it has been named, and 
the sister sciences of geology and geography at 
the same time. In fact it is impossible to study 
either without giving attention to the other 
two, and therefore, instead of being separate 
sciences, they are the three branches of a great 
scientific trinity. 

The regions here referred to enjoy the advan- 



2 Cave Begions of the 

tage, and at the same time suffer the disadvan- 
tage, of being comparatively little known to the 
ever restless tide of tourists who naturally hail 
with pleasure the announcement that some easily 
accessible, and thoroughly charming spot, has 
escaped their attention altogether, with a 
marvelous store of attractions which are both 
extremely old and wholly new. 

Each of these regions has a peculiar geologi- 
cal history not repeated in any other portions of 
the earth's surface : each is blessed with its own 
peculiar style of beautiful scenery : and each 
vies with the other and all the world besides for 
the supremacy of its truly wonderful caves. 
Yet it should be well understood that the claims 
are not based on an unworthy spirit of rivalry, 
nor any desire to deny the greatness and beauty 
of already famous members of the Cave family. 
It is simply an announcement that the family is 
much larger than has been generally supposed, 
and the more recently presented members worthy 
of the full measure of distinguished honors. 

The geological authorities of both states have 
for many years mentioned the beauty and im- 
portance of these regions, and urged their claims 
to public attention, but have been prevented, 
by the pressure of other duties, from giving to 
the caves such careful study and full reports as 
they deserve, as it would have been a pleasure 
to give, and as has been possible in states of less 



Ozarks and Black Hilla. 3 

extent where the general work of the depart- 
ment is more advanced, and the volume of tour- 
ist travel created an early demand for scientific 
explanation. 

Without any great diflficulty we can under- 
stand the process of cave excavation by the 
action of percolating acidulated water on the 
limestone, and its subsequent removal as the 
volume of surface drainage diverted to the new 
channel gradually increased. But it is not so 
easy to offer a reason for the varied forms with 
which the caves are afterwards decorated. Why 
is it the charmed waters do not leave the evi- 
dence of their slow passage only in plain 
surfaces of varying widths, and the stalactites 
and stalagmites whose formation we can readily 
account for? And why do not the deposits take 
the same forms in all caves with only such 
variations as would naturally result from differ- 
ences in topography? The law is written, but 
in unfamiliar characters that render our reading 
slow and uncertain. Yet it is conspicuously 
noticeable that those caves showing the most 
delicately fragile and wonderfully varied forms 
of decoration are those traversed by the most 
sweeping and changeable, or even reversible, 
currents of air ; which might lead to the con- 
clusion that the moisture is sprayed or converted 
into a light, misty vapor, and then deposited in 
exactly the same manner as the beautiful frost- 



4 Cave Regions of the 

work at Niagara: the direction and force of the 
current determining the location of the frail 
deposits. 

Since the largest and most important caves 
occur in limestone, a little special attention to 
the cause of their occurrence there may serve to 
show that although speleology has only recently 
received its name and been elevated to the rank 
of a separate and independent science, it is one 
of the earth's ancient institutions. 

Our geologists, who have unearthed many 
secrets not dreamed of even in Humboldt's 
"good phylosopy," have settled the question 
of how the different kinds of caves were formed, 
according to the character of rocks they are in, 
or their location and depth, and the natural 
agencies to whose action they show signs of 
having been subjected. 

Dr. H. C. Hovey, in his " Celebrated Ameri- 
can Caverns," says: "In visiting caves of 
large extent, one is at first inclined to regard 
the long halls, huge rifts, deep pits and lofty 
domes, as evidences of great convulsions of 
nature, whereby the earth has been violently 
rent asunder. But, while mechanical forces 
have had their share in the work, as has been 
shown, the main agent in every case has been 
the comparatively gentle, invisible gas known as 
carbonic acid. This is generated by the decay 
of animal and vegetable substances, and is to a 



Ozarks and Black Mills. 5 

considerable degree soluble in water. Under 
ordinary circumstances one measure of water 
will absorb one measure of carbonic acid; and 
the eye will detect no difference in its appear- 
ance. Under pressure the power of absorption 
is rapidly increased, until the water thus sur- 
charged has an acid taste, and effervesces on 
flowing from the earth, as in Saratoga water. 

"Rain-water, falling amid leaves and grass, 
and sinking into the soil, absorbs large quanti- 
ties of carbonic acid. On reaching the under- 
lying limestone, the latter is instantly attacked 
by the acidulated water in which it is dissolved 
and carried away. 

"It is agreed among geologists, amazing as 
the statement may seem, that the immense 
caverns of Virginia, Kentucky and Indiana, 
including Mammoth Cave itself (the largest of 
all), were eaten out of the solid mass of lime- 
stone by the slow, patient, but irresistible action 
of acidulated water." 

Professor N. S. Shaler says: " The existence 
of deep caverns is a sign that the region has 
long been above the sea." 

Through the kindness of Professor C. J. Nor- 
wood, Chief Inspector aud Curator of the 
Geological Department of Kentucky, it is possi- 
ble to quote the first oflScial report made on the 
caves of that state and published in 1856, in 
Volume I., Kentucky Geological Survey Reports. 



6 Cave Regions of the 

Dr. Norwood says: "Referring to the 'Sub- 
carboniferous Limestone ' (now known as the 
St. Louis group of theMississippian series), Dr. 
Owen says : ' The southern belt of this forma- 
tion is wonderfully cavernous, especially in its 
upper beds, which being more argillaceous, and 
impregnated with earths and alkalies, are 
disposed to produce salts, vrhich oozing through 
the pores of the stone effloresce on its surface, 
and thus tend to disintegrate and scale oiF, 
independent of the solvent effects of the 
carbonated water. Beneath overhanging ledges 
of limestone, quantities of fine earthy rubbish 
can be seen, weathered off from such causes. 
In these I have detected sulphate of lime, sul- 
phate of magnesia, nitrate of lime, and occa- 
sionally sulphate of soda. The tendency which 
some calcareous rocks have to produce nitrate of 
lime is, probably, one of the greatest causes of 
disintegration.' " 

"Most extensive subterranean areas thushave 
been excavated or undermined in Edmonson, Hart, 
Grayson, Butler, Logan, Todd, Christian and 
Trig. In the vicinity of Green River, in the 
first of these counties, the known avenues of the 
Mammoth Cave amount to two hundred and 
twenty-three, the united length of the whole be- 
ing estimated, by those best acquainted with 
the Cave, at one hundred and fifty miles; 
say that the average width and height of these 



Ozarks and Black Hills. 7 

passages amount to seven yards each way, 
which is perhaps near the truth ; this would 
give upwards of twelve million cubic yards of 
cavernous space which has been excavated 
through the agency of calcareous waters and 
atmospheric vicissitudes." 

Page 169 : " On the south side of Green River 
the platform of limestone forming the descent 
into Mammoth Cave is two hundred and 
thirty-two feet above Green River." 

•'The entrance to the cave, being thirty- 
eight feet lower than this bed of lime- 
stone, is one hundred and ninty-four .feet 
above Green River. In the above two hun- 
dred and thirty-two feet there are several 
heavy masses of sandstone, viz: at one hun- 
dred and twenty-five, one hundred and forty- 
five, one hundred and fifty, one hundred and sixty 
and two hundred and fifteen feet, but it is proba- 
ble that most of these have tumbled from higher 
positions in the hill, as no alterations of sand- 
stone have been observed at these levels in the 
cave. From an elevation of from two hun- 
dred and forty to two hundred and fifty feet, 
the prevalent rock is sandstone without 
pebbles, which can be seen extending up 
to three hundred and twelve feet to the 
foundation of the Cave Hotel. The 
united thickness of the limestone beds on this 
part of Green River, is about two hun- 



8 Cave Begions of the 

dred and thirty feet, capped with eighty 
feet of sandstone. About midway of the 
section on this part of Green River, are 
limestones of an obscure oolitic structure, but 
no true oolite was observed. Many of these 
limestones are of such composition as to be 
acted on freely by the elements of the atmos- 
phere, which, in the form of nitric acid, com- 
bine with the earthy and alkaline bases of cal- 
careous rock, and give rise to the formation of 
nitrates with the liberation of carbonic acid ; 
hence the disintegrated rubbish of the caves 
yields nitrate of potash after being treated with 
the ley of ashes and subsequent evaporation of 
the saline lixivium. The wonderfully caver- 
nous character of the subcarboniferous lime- 
stones of the Green River valley, and, indeed, 
of these particular members of the subcarbonif- 
erous group throughout a great part of its range 
in Kentucky and Indiana, is due in a great 
measure to this cause, together with the solvent 
and eroding effects of water charged with car- 
bonic acid. The 'rock-houses' frequently en- 
countered both in this formation and in the 
limestones of Silurian date, are produced by 
similar causes; the more easily disintegrated 
beds gradually crumbling away, while the more 
durable remain in overhanging ledges. By the 
oxidation of other elements, sulphates of oxide 
of iron and alkalies result, which, by double 



Ozarhs and Black mils. 9 

decomposition, v/ith carbonate of lime, give 
rise to the formation of gypsums which appears 
in the form of rosettes, festoons and various 
other imitative forms on the walls and ceilings of 
the caves. Crystallizations of sulphate of 
soda and sulphate of magnesia are not uncom- 
mon, both in some of the caves and in sheltered 
situations under shelving rocks." 

The explanations thus given of the excava- 
tion and subsequent refilling and decoration 
of the limestone caves of Kentucky and Indi- 
ana apply equally well to those of other states ; 
but it is to be remembered that at the time of 
Dr. Owen's report, onyx, the most beautiful 
and valuable of dripstones, had not yet been 
discovered in the United States ; while now es- 
pecially fine deposits are known in California, 
Utah, Missouri, South Dakota and Arkansas; 
the Missouri supply being exceptionally valua- 
ble on account of the marvelous delicacy and 
beauty of its coloring; nor can it soon be ex- 
hausted, as deposits have been found in eight 
counties and further exploration will no doubt 
discover more. 

Concerning the Subcarbonif erous, or Missis- 
sippian Series in Part I., Vol. IV., Missouri Geo- 
logical Survey, Dr. C. R. Keyes says: "In the 
great interior basin of the Mississippi the basal 
series is exposed more or less continuously over 



10 Cave Regions of the 

broad areas, extending from northern Iowa to 
Alabama, and from Ohio to Mexico." 

While this broadly extended series of lime- 
stone is honey-combed in many places and all 
directions by wonderful caverns, those of the 
Ozark regions in Missouri, although compara- 
tively little known, are well worth knowing, 
and are possibly the most ancient limestone 
caves in the world. Of the region in which 
they occur, Dr. Keyes, in the volume last quoted, 
says: " The chief typographical feature of the 
state has long been known in the Ozark uplift, a 
broad plateau v/ith gentle quaquaversal slopes 
rising to a height of more than one thousand 
five hundred feet above mean tide, and 
extending almost entirely across the south- 
ern part of the district. On all sides 
the borders of this highland area are deeply 
grooved by numberless streams flowing in nar- 
row gorges. Against its nucleus of very an- 
cient granites and porphyries the Ozark 
series of magnesian limestone was laid 
down. Then the area occupied by these 
rocks was elevated, and around its margins 
were deposited successively the other members 
of the Paleozoic. The Ozark region was 
thus the first land to appear wilhin the 
borders of the present state of Missouri." He 
further says: "Although it has long been known 
that the Magnesian Limestones are older than the 



Ozarks and Black Hills. 11 

Trenton, and that they lie immediately upon 
and against the Archsean crystallines iincomform- 
ably, their exact geological age has alM^ays 
remained unsettled. There seems to be but 
little doubt, however, that part of the series is 
equivalent to the Calcifcrous of other regions. 
It is also pretty well determined that certain of 
the lower beds, all below the ' Saccliaroidal ' 
Sandstone perhap?, are representatives of the 
Upper Cambrian or Potsdam. These conclusions 
appear well grounded both upon stratigraphical 
and faunal evidence. The rocks of the Ozark 
region have not as yet received the necessary 
detailed study to enable the several lines of de- 
markation to be drawn with certainty. This 
investigation is now being carried on as rapidly 
as possible, and promises very satisfactory and 
interesting results in the near future." 

"The early geological reports represent the 
Magnesian Limestone series as made up of seven 
members. . Following Swallow, these may be 
briefly described in the present connection. Be- 
ginning at the top, they are: 

First Magnesian Limestone. 

First, or Saccharoidal Sandstone. 

Second Magnesian Limestone. 

Second Sandstone. 

Third Magnesian Limestone. 

Third Sandstone. 

Fourth Limestone," 



12 Cave Regions of the 

"The Fourth" Magnesian Limestone, or lowest 
number of the Ozark series recognized, has its 
typical exposures along the Niangua and Osage 
rivers in Morgan and Camden counties. 

Professor Swallow, in his Missouri Geological 
Survey Reports I. and IF, 1853 and 1854, says: 
"Caves, natural bridges and subterranean 
streams occur in the valley of the Osage and its 
tributaries." The same authority of forty years 
ago also mentions that "Some of the grandest 
scenery in the State is produced by the high 
castellated and mural bluffs of this (Third Mag- 
nesian Limestone) Formation, on the Niangua 
and the Osage." Another reference to the 
scenery on these rivers describes it as "Wild 
and grand, beautiful and unique ;" with "gaudy- 
colored bluffs." In the section on building 
materials he remarks; "One of the most 
desirable of the Missouri marbles is in the Third 
Magnesian Limestone on the Niangaa. It is 
fine-grained, crystalline, silico-magnesian lime- 
stone of a light drab, slightly tinged with peach- 
blossom, and beautifully clouded with the same 
hue or flesh color. It is twenty feet thick and 
crops out in the bluffs. This marble is rarely 
surpassed in the qualities which fit it for orna- 
mental architecture." 

The Ozarks in the extreme southern portion of 
the state are even less known to the world, but 
the scenery is grand, the climate delightful, 



Ozarks and Black Hills. 18 

and the caves worthy of a visit for themselves 
alone. The State of Missouri being one third 
larger than England, and of equal size to Switz- 
erland, Holland, Belgium and Denmark combined, 
it is not surprising that interesting discoveries 
are still to be expected. 

The climate is so varied on account of the 
range in latitude and altitude, and the natural 
resources are so great, the claim has been made 
that if the State were surrounded by an impas- 
sable wall, its citizens need not be deprived of 
any article necessary to a refined and luxurious 
mode of living: and according to Mr. Henry 
Gannett in "The Building of a Nation," the 
population in 1890 was 73.42 per cent, native 
whites of native parents, the colored a little less 
than 6 per cent., and nearly two-thirds of the 
balance, native born of parents, one or both of 
whom were foreign. 

Although the Ozark region has not yet received 
suflQcient attention to dull its charm for the 
explorer, the fact has been established that its 
earliest sedimentary rocks are of the Cambrian 
Age and still occupy mainly the position in 
which they were originally deposited. Therefore 
we need not be surprised to discover that some, 
at least, of the excavations are proportionately 
ancient; and that the Natural Bridges are the 
last remaining positive evidence of their former 
existence and final collapse. That the Natural 



14 Cave Regions of the 

Bridges of Missouri mark the destruction of 
more ancient caves than the one preserved to 
geological history by Virginia's grand attraction, 
seems quite evident. The greater age of the 
rocks indicates the possibility of earlier excava- 
tion while their undisturbed position suggests 
that destruction resulted, not from violent earth 
movement, but from the slow action of agencies 
requiring long periods of time. 

Before proceeding to a discussion of the 
caves visited personally for the gratification of 
private interest, it is desirable to know what 
attention has been given to the subject, inci- 
dentally, in the course of regular official duty on 
the Missouri Geological Survey. 

CAVES DESCRIBED IN THE STATE REPORTS. 

Although many unknown caves must yet be 
discovered in the imperfectly explored portions 
of the vast Ozark forests, these finds are already 
so numerous as to seldom attract attention 
according to their just deserts. 

One of the comparatively recent of these dis- 
coveries is Crystal Cave, at Joplic, det-cribed on 
page 566, Vol. VII., Missouri Geological Survey 
Report 1894.* It was opened in tlie lower work- 
ings of a shaftof the Empire Zinc C orap.iny, and 
"The entire surface of the cave, top, sides 
and bottom, is lined with calcite crystals, so 

'•'Lead and Zinc. Prof. C. R. Keyes, 



Ozarks and Black Hilts. 15 

closely packed together as to form a continuous 
sheet and most of them of great size, and well 
formed faces. Scalenohedra as much as two feet 
long are sometimes seen, and others a foot or 
more in length are common. Planes or crystal 
ghosts, sometimes with pyrite crystals, marking 
stages of growth in the calcite crystals, are often 
distinguishable. The entire absence of any- 
thing like stalactites is noticeable, and together 
with the presence of the crystals, show that the 
cave was completely filled with water during 
their growth." In the same volume, all those 
counties in the extreme southwest corner of the 
state, whose geological age has not heretofore 
been considered positively determined, are 
mapped as Lower Carboniferous, and Lower Silur- 
ian, with the Coal Measures covering portions of 
Barton and Jasper and appearing in a few small, 
scattered spots in Dade, Polk, Green and Chris- 
tian counties, and some scanty lines of Devonian 
fringing the edges of the Silurian in Barton and 
McDonald. 

Other State reports make mention of many 
caves and fine springs, and also several natural 
bridges worthy of special notice. In Mr. G. C. 
Broadhead's report for 1873-1874, he gives a 
short but interesting chapter on caves and water 
supplies, in which he says that "Caves occur in 
the Third Magnesian Limestone, Saccharoidal 



16 Cave Regions of the 

Sandstone, Trenton, Lithographic, Encrinital 
and St. Louis Limestone," 

"In Eastern and Northeast Missouri there 
have not been found many large eaves in the 
Encrinital Limestone, but the lower beds of this 
formation in Southwest Missouri often enclose 
very large caverns; among the latter may be 
included the caves of Green County with some 
in Christian and McDonald. Those in McDonald 
I have not seen, but they are reported to be very 
extensive and probably are situated in the 
Encrinital Limestone." 

Under the head of "Special Descriptions" he 
says: "On Sac River, in the north part of 
Green County, we find a cave with two en- 
trances, one at the foot of a hill, opening 
toward Sac River, forty-five f^et high and eighty 
feet wide. The other entrance is from the hill- 
top, one hundred and fifty feet back from the face 
of the bluff. These two passages unite. The 
exact dimensions of the cave are not known, but 
there are several beautiful and large rooms lined 
with stalactites and stalagmites which often 
assume both beautiful and grotesque life-like 
forms. The cave has been explored for several 
hundred yards, showing the formations to be 
thick silicious beds of the Lower Carboniferous 
formations." 

"Knox cave, in Green County, is said to be of 



Ozarks and Black Hills. 17 

large dimensions. I have not seen it, but some 
of its stalactites are quite handsome." 

"Wilson's Creek sinks beneath the Limestone 
and appears again below." 

"There are several eaves near Ozark, Christian 
County, which issue from the same formation 
as those in G-reen County. On a branch of 
Finly Creek a stream disappears in a sink, ap- 
pearing again three-quarters of a mile southeast 
through an opening sixty feet high by ninety- 
eight feet wide. Up stream the cave continues 
this size for ahundred yards and then decreases in 
size, and for the next quarter of a mile further 
it is generally ten by fourteen feet wide. A 
very clear, cool stream passes out, in which by 
careful search crawfish without eyes can be 
found." 

"There is another cave a few miles south of 
Ozark, and another ten miles southeast occurs in 
the Magnesian Limestone." 

' 'In Boone County there are several caves in 
the Encrinital Limestone. Conner's, the largest, 
is said to have been explored for a distance of 
eight miles." 

' 'In Pike and Lincoln there are several small 
caves occurring in the upper beds of Trenton 
Limestone, which are often very cavernous. On 
Sulphur Fork of Cuivre, there is a cave and 
Natural Bridge, to which parties for pleasure 
often resort. The bridge is tubular with twenty 



18 Cave Regions of the 

feet between the walls, and is one hundred feet 
long." 

"At J. P. Fisher's on Spencer Creek, Ralls 
Countj, there is a cave having an entrance of 
ninety feet wide by twenty feet high. The Lower 
Trenton beds occupy the floor, with the upper 
cavernous beds above. On the bluff, at a dis- 
tance of one hundred and fifty yards back, there 
is a sink-hole v/hich communicates with the cave. 
Within the cave is a cool, clear spring of water, 
and Mr. F. said he could keep meat fresh there 
for six weeks during midsummer." 

"The Third Magnesian Limestone which oc- 
cupies such a large portion of Southwest Mis- 
souri, often contains very large caves. One of 
them, known as Friede's cave, is six or eight 
miles Northwest of Rolla, on Cave Spring 
Creek." 

"It is said to have been explored for several 
miles, but I only passed in a few hundred yards. 
The stalactites here are very beautiful, assuming 
the structure of satin spar. A very clear stream 
of water issues out. West of the Gasconade, on 
Clifty Creek, is a remarkable Natural Bridge 
which I have elsewhere described in Geological 
Survey of Missouri, 1855-71, page 16." 

"Mr. Meek speaks of a large and interesting 
cave on Tavern Creek, in Miller County. Dr. 
Shumard estimates a cave on Bryant's Fork, in 
Ozark County, to be a mile and a half long." 



Ozarks and Black Hills. 19 

This description of Dr. Shiimard's is in the 
Geological Survey of Missouri, 1855-71, page 
196, v/here ho says: 

' ' The entrance is thirty-five feet vdde and thir- 
ty feet high, and is situated at the foot of a per- 
pendicular cliff, and far above the water-level of 
Bryant. Just within the entrance it expands to 
sixty or seventy feet, with a height of about fifty 
feet; and this part of the cave has been used 
by the citizens of the county as a place for hold- 
ing camp-meeting. I estimated its length at not 
far short of one mile and a half. The main 
passage is in general quite spacious, the roof 
elevated, and the floor tolerably level, but often 
wet and miry. For some distance beyond the 
entrance there is not much to attract attention; 
but as we proceed, at the far extremity tlie 
chambers are quite as picturesque as the most 
noted of the well-known Mammoth Cave. The 
ceilings, sides and floor are adorned with a mul- 
titude of stalactites and stalagmites arranged 
in fanciful combinations, and assuming a vari- 
ety of fantastic and beautiful forms." 

Many of these caves contain niter, which 
occurs as a mineral and not as evidence of for- 
mer animal occupation, it being found in the 
form of effervescenses on the walls. Dr. Shu- 
mard mentions several of this character in Pu- 
laski County, the most noted being Niter Cave, 
in the Third Magnesian Limestone, with a wide 



20 Cave Begions of the 

entrance thirty feet above the level of the Gascon- 
ade. On page 201, he also gives a charming 
description of one of the immense springs that 
are numerous in this region and that I have 
never seen elsewhere. He says: 

" Ozark County is bountifully supplied with 
springs of the finest water, and some of them 
of remarkably large size. The largest one is 
situated near the North Fork, in T. 24, R. 11 
W., Sec. 32, and is known under the name of the 
Double Spring. It issues from near the base of 
a bluff of Sandstone and Magnesian Limestone, 
a few feet above the level of the North Fork. 
This spring discharges an immense volume of 
water, which is divided bj a huge mass of Sand- 
stone into twostreams,with swift currents flowing 
in opposite directions to join the North Fork 
about one hundred and fifty yards distant from 
the spring. I estimated the width of these 
streams at not less than fifty yards. They are 
separated from the North Fork by a pretty 
wooded island one hundred yards long. The 
upper stream affords a good mill-site. I am 
informed that the quantity of water discharged 
by this magnificent spring is not materially 
diminished during the dryest seasons of the 
year. The temperature of the water measured 
at the edge of the spring, was found to be 56° ; 
the temperature of the air at the same time, 59°. 
Other springs of considerable magnitude occur 



Ozarks and Black Hills. 21 

in various portions of the county, giving rise to 
"beautiful and limpid streams." 

The descriptions of the Natural Bridge and 
Friede's cave, near Rolla, previously referred to 
as being on page 16 of the same volume, are as 
follows : 

" On Clifty Creek found the chert bed of Sec. 
21-5 occurring about sixty feet from the top of 
the Third Magnesian Limestone, with a road 
passing over its upper surface, presenting it 
very favorably for observation. It seemed 
here to be broken by vertical cracks into large 
rhomboidal blocks. Further up this creek in a 
wild and secluded spot, observed a Natural 
Bridge with six feet of this chert bed at its base, 
and Silicious Magnesian Limestone above. The 
span of this bridge is about thirty feet, an ele- 
vation of opening about fifteen feet above the 
water, the thickness of the rock above is about 
twelve feet, and width on top about fif- 
teen feet. Two small streams come together, 
one from the west and another from the south- 
west. A point of the bluff on the south-west 
fork spans the northern fork, and terminates 
about sixty feet beyond in a sharp point ; a few 
large masses of rock lie near the termination of 
the promontory, and fifty feet beyond, the 
bluffs of the opposite hills rise abruptly from 
the bottoms. The bluffs, both above and below, 
are very precipitous, the middle and lower beds 



22 Cave Regions of the 

of the Third Magnesian Limestone forming per- 
pendicular escarpments, frequently studded 
with cedar, some occurring on top of the bridge. 
A perfectly clear stream of water courses through 
this valley. The bottoms near are overspread 
with a dense growth of trees and vines, among 
which latter I noticed the Muscadine grape, 
The valley at this part being shut in by its per- 
pendicular cliffs wuth not a path to guide the 
traveler through the dense thickets, is v/ildly 
picturesque and romantic in its loneliness." 

Of the cave he says: " This cave is a quar- 
ter of a mile east of Cave Spring Creek, and has 
a wide and elevated entrance; passing into it 
a hundred yards or more, the passage narrows, 
and in order to go further a stream of water 
has frequently to be waded through ; this pas- 
sage has been followed by some persons several 
miles without finding any object of interest; 
but a few hundred yards from the entrance, by 
diverging to the right, we enter a large cham- 
ber, studded with stalactites and stalagmites, 
many uniting and forming solid columns of sup- 
port. Many of these are very beautiful, and 
often as white as alabaster. There are other 
large rooms, but they possess no peculiar inter- 
est. Found large deposits of earth on the floor 
bavicg a saline taste." 

Of the extensive pine forests in Ozark 
County, he says: "The size and quality of the 



Ozarks and Black Hills. 23 

timber will compare favorably with that of the 
celebrated pineries of Wisconsin and Minnesota." 

In several other counties the pine is equally 
good, and other valuable timber everywhere 
abundant, although in a school geography pub- 
lished in 1838, the following descriptions of 
this region occur: 

" The lowlands of the Mississippi are bounded 
by the region of the Ozark Mountains. "With 
the exception of the alluvial tracts on the bor- 
ders of the streams, it is extremely hilly and 
broken. The mountains rise from eight hun- 
dred to eighteen hundred feet above the streams, 
with rounded summits and often perpendicular 
cliffs, and have a rocky surface, which admits 
only a scanty growth of timber." * * 

"Missouri is generally a region of prairies and 
table lands, much of which, as already described, 
is almost destitute of timber and water. It is 
crossed by the Ozark Mountains, which form a 
rugged tract of considerable extent. Earth- 
quakes are not infrequent in some parts of this 
state. The soil is not generally productive." 

A comparison of these curious views vvith the 
latest official reports is highly amusing, as well 
as suggestive that, early impressions are liable 
to require modification. 

In addition to the wonderful springs of pure 
water, there are numerous fine mineral springs, 
among which are a number of Epsom salt springs. 



24 Cave Jiegions, 

At Jacksonville, in Randolph County, there is a 
large mineral spring from which it is said an 
over-heated horse may drink all he will without 
injury. Epsom-salts, or Epsomite, frequently 
occurs, as does the Niter, in a crystalline form 
of the pure mineral, as an efflorescence on rocks 
in many of the caves and in other sheltered po- 
sitions. 



•\ 



CHAPTER II. 

MARBLE CAVE. 

Marble Cave, which is the finest yet explored 
in Missouri, is southeast of the center of Stone 
County, a short distance north of the picturesque 
White River. The nearest station is Marion- 
ville on the St. Louis and^San Francisco railroad, 
and the drive of forty miles is delightful, but 
can be divided, into two of twenty each by a stop 
at Galena. The road, for the most part, is 
naturally macadamized and is through a most 
charming country whose roughness and beauty 
increase together as the journey advances. At 
first it winds along fertile valleys between wood- 
ed hills, crossing many times a shallow stream 
of water so clear as to afford no concealment for 
an occasional water-moccasin, whose bite is 
said to be not poisonous if inflicted under water, 
and which must be true because the horses 
showed not the least uneasiness. 

The second week in May found the vegeta- 
tion in its summer beauty; strawberries were 
ripe, and the weather without a fault. 

Galena is pleasantly situated on the hills over- 
looking the James River, and is entirely in- 

25 



26 Cave Regions of the 

visible from the road by which it is approached 
until a slight curve in the line of ascent ends 
the first half of the journey with surprising 
suddenness. In the immediate vicinity there 
are several small caves which are worthy of 
attention and will be described later on. 

To properly picture the twenty miles of 
changing and charming views between Galena 
and Marble Cave would require the light and 
skillful touch of a special artist gifted with a 
tangible perception of atmospheric values. 
Gradually the road forsakes the pretty valleys 
with their fields and streams, to take the sum- 
mit of the hills and then be known as the "Ridge 
Road," which affords a wide range of vision not 
previously enjoyed, presenting scenes not to be 
found reproduced elsewhere with any degree of 
exactness. Looking into the depth of the forest 
as it slopes away on either side, the impression 
is of a magnificent park, undefaced by what are 
called improvements. This effect is produced 
by the scarcity, or entire abseace of underbrush , 
and a beautiful surface covering of grasses or 
flowering plants of all kinds and colors, varivd 
here and there with masses of ferns of unusual 
size and delicate beauty. The most u.nexpected and 
lavish feature of the rich display is the many miles 
of fragrant honeysuckle that grows only eighteen 
inches high in the forest shade, but if trans- 
planted to a sunny spot develops into the famil- 



/.*.'^-v.< :';;-*Xi: 






^ ,^^ it^ jjt'- ''•« ^« 



niz 



A Mill-Site Neau Mauble Cave. 



Ozarks and Black Hills. 27 

iar vine. The most beautiful portion of all this 
is called The "Wilderness, and seems designed 
for a National Park. Such a park reserve, even 
if very small, could not fail to be a lasting 
pleasure, since it would be more accessible to 
large centers of population than other reserves, 
and its most delightful seasons are spring and 
autumn when the Yellowstone is under snow. 

The distant view obtained through open spaces 
is an undulating forest in all directions, being 
apparently both trackless and endless. The 
great variety of greens observed in the foliage 
blends in the distance into one dark shade, 
then changes to dark blue, which gradually fades 
out to a hazy uncertainty where ifc is lost at the 
sky-line. 

As long ago as 1853, the variety and abun- 
dance of the natural growth of fruits through- 
out the Ozarks was observed hj Professor Swal- 
low, who then advised the planting of vines. 

Beyond the Wilderness is the Marble Cave 
property and the entrance to the Cave is through 
a large sink-hole in the top of Roark Mountain. 
This hole is said to be about two hundred feet 
long, one hundred feet wide and thirty-five feet 
deep. It is shaped like a great oblong bowl 
with sloping sides, divided irregularly near the 
middle, and having the bottom broken out in a 
jagged way that is very handsome and gives 
an ample support to the growth of ferns, wild 



26 Cave Regions of the 

roses, and other vegetation with which it is 
abundantly decorated. About half of the de- 
scent into the basin is accomplished by scramb- 
• ling down the roughly broken rocks, and the 
balance by a broad wooden stairway ending 
at a narrow platform that supports the locked 
gate. 

For kind and valuable assistance rendered to 
insure the success and pleasure of the visit to 
the wonderful cave, which they regard with 
affection and pride, very cordial thanks are due 
to Gapt. T. S. Powell, former manager, his son, 
Mr. Will Powell, the first guide, and Mr. Fred 
Prince, who has made the only official survey 
and map. It may be stated here that the survey 
and map are far from complete, and many 
known passages have never yet been entered. 

Being the first visiting party of the season, 
certain disadvantages were encountered in a 
great accumulation of wet clay and rubbish, 
washed in by the rains since the previous sum- 
mer ; but the gate was opened with considerable 
effort, and slowly and cautiously we descended 
the slippery, clay-banked stairs to the immense 
mound of debris forty-five feet below the gate, 
to behold, at last, the grandeur of the Audi- 
torium. 

The magnificence of that one chamber should 

^ give to Marble Cave a world-wide fame even if 

there were nothing more beyond. The blue-gray 



Ozarks and Black Hills. 29 

limestone walls have a greater charm than those 
of an open canon, owing to the fact that they 
sweep away from any given point in long, true 
curves to form an elliptical chamber three 
hundred and fifty feet long by one hundred and 
twenty-iive feet wide, with the vault above 
showing absolute perfection of arch, and measur- 
ing, by the survey, from its lowest to its 
highest point, one hundred and ninety-five 
feet. These measurements are said to be 
indisputably correct, and if so, the Auditorium of 
Marble Cave is the largest unsupported, perfect 
arch in the world ; it being one hundred feet 
longer than the famous Mormon Tabernacle at 
Salt Lake City. In addition to the artistic 
superiority of architectural form, its acoustic 
properties having been tested, it is found to be 
truly an auditorium. The curving walls and 
pure atmosphere combine to aid the voice, and 
carry its softest tones with marvelous distinct- 
ness to every portion of the immense inclosed 
space. As a concert hall its capacity has been 
tested by musicians who are said to have been 
enthusiastic over the success of their experi- 
ments. Several years ago a piano was lowered 
into the cave for use on a special occasion, and 
still occupies a position on the dancing platform, 
where it will probably remain indefinitely under 
the scant protection of a small canvas tent. 
The chief ornament of the Auditorium is the 



30 Cave Regions of the 

White Throne, a stalagmitic mass that when 
viewed from the stairway appears to rest solid- 
ly against the most distant wall, and looks so 
small an object in that vast space as to render a 
realization of its actual measurement impossible. 
The height of the Throne is sixty-five feet and 
the girth two hundred. It is a mass of drip- 
stone resting on a limestone base reserved from 
the ancient excavation to receive it, and on care- 
ful inspection the perpendicular lines, observed 
on the front, are found to be a set of rather large 
organ pipes. A fresh fracture shows the Throne 
to be a most beautiful white and gold onyx. 
The outer surface has now received a thin coat- 
ing of yellow clay which was, of course, 
regretted, but later observations on onyx build- 
ing reveals the pleasing fact that if the crystal- 
bearing waters continue to drip, the yellow clay 
will supply the coloring matter for a golden 
band of crystal. • 

The Throne is hollow and has a natural open- 
ing in one side by which it may be entered, but 
the space within is too limited to invite a 
lengthy stay. That portion of the outside 
which is nearest the wall is formed with suffi- 
cient irregularity of outline to admit of an 
ascent to the top, and the view obtained is well 
worth the difficult scramble up and the appre- 
hensive slide down. Being raised so high above 
all . objects that divide attention or in some 



Ozarks and Black Hills. 31 

degree obstruct the view, permits a freedom of 
outlook that sensibly increases the appreciation 
of the vastness of the enclosed chamber and its 
enclosing walls. Efforts to establish the age of 
the deposit by observations on the yearly growth, 
would afford little satisfaction, for the obvious 
reason that conditions governing the growth are 
dependent, in a measure, on each season's vege- 
tation. Deposit began, of course, after the 
erosion of the chamber ceased, and therefore 
represents only a fraction of the age of the cave 
itself. About thirty feet west of the White 
Throne and against the wall, stands the next 
onyx attraction in the form of a beautiful fluted 
column nearly twenty feet high, tapering up 
from a base three feet in diameter, and known 
as the Spring Room Sentinel, because the Spring 
of Youth is just behind it although not directly 
connected with the Auditorium ; it being the 
first chamber on the left in Total Depravity 
Passage, a wet and dangerous way of which 
next to nothing is known, but the entrance to 
which is a fine arch a few feet west of the Senti- 
nel. The Spring of Youth is reached by climb- 
ing through a window-like opening, and is very 
small, very wet, very cold, and very beautiful. 
It is not more than ten feet high nor six in its 
greatest length and breadth, but every inch of 
its irregular surface is composed of dripstone of 
a bright yellowish-red and colorless crystal ; and 



82 Cave Begions of the 

down the glittering walls trickles clear and 
almost ice-cold water, to the onyx floor where it 
is caught and held in a marvelous fluted bowl of 
its own manufacture. This is said to be the 
gem of the whole cave and seems to have been 
placed where it is for the consolation of those 
who are unable to enjoy the peculiar grandeur 
of the Auditorium, and leave it as some actually 
are said to do, with a sense of disappointment, 
because it is not the gleaming white hall of 
marble which some writers for reputable 
journals have allowed their imaginations to 
create. 

In winter the Spring of Youth Room takes on 
a complete coating of ice, with icicles of all 
sizes hanging from the ceiling and projections. 
The effect is described as being wonderfully 
beautiful. 

Further down Total Depravity Passage we 
were not urged to go, because at that season of 
the year it is wet and difficult, without any 
sufficient promise of a brilliant compensation for 
the achievement of such a journey. But the 
Spring of Youth Room, or as it is generally 
called, the Spring Room, is more than ample 
justification for the existence of the passage, 
and would still be if that passage were several 
miles in length and the attraction located at the 
most distant limit. 

The various passages in Marble Cave are by 




Wall in Spring Room. 

Page 32. 



Ozarks and Black Hills. 33 

no means alike or even similar; some having 
been opened by the action of water assisted only 
by acid carried in solution ; while others are the 
unmistakable crevices of earthquake origin, 
afterwards enlarged, or perhaps only remodeled, 
as we might say, by the water's untiring energy 
in changing the position of rock masses without 
obliterating evidences of original design. 

A glance at the map shows the sudden break- 
ing oif of the various passages represented; the 
end, however, is not of the passages themselves, 
but only of the exploration or the survey of them, 
and there is a possibility that future develop- 
ments will lead to the discovery of more caves 
than are yet known. However that may be, the 
glimpses already had into the beyond are said 
to be alluring. 

To the north of the Auditorium, which was 
until recently called the Grand Amphitheater, 
there opens out a kind of alcove extension known 
as the Mother Hubbard Room, and spreading 
out from this is the corridor, a room about one 
hundred and twenty-five feet long and seventy- 
five feet in width, with a low, narrow passage, 
or crawl, leading from the northeast into the 
Grotto, a dome-shaped room formerly called the 
Battery, on account of the great number of bats 
that used to congregate in it. It is about forty 
feet in diameter and fifty feet in height. On 
one. side of this room is a narrow "squeeze" 



34 Cave Regions of the 

opening into a passage several feet lower than 
the floor level of the Grotto and leading to the 
Spanish Room, which when discovered bore 
indications of having been occupied by a human 
being who had tried to escape by tunneling, or 
by reaching a hole in the roof; which is said to 
be impossible for him to have done without 
outside assistance. As no bones have been found 
we may hope the assistance arrived in time. 
When the discovery of the room was made, a 
quantity of loose rock was piled before the 
entrance, so if he ever escaped it was not by that 
way. 

After crawling back to the Corridor, through 
the same small, but dry passage of seventy feet 
length, we saw a narrow ledge of fine crystals, 
a deposit of Epsom salts, and a few bats that 
in the dim light looked white but are a light tan 
color with brown wings. A good specimen 
hanging on a projecting ledge of the wall 
remained undisturbed by us and our lights, 
giving an opportunity for careful inspection so 
that we presently discovered it to be a mummy; 
which naturally suggests that this portion of the 
cave, being dry and opening out of the great 
temple-like Auditorium as an alcove, could be 
converted into an imposing crypt. 

Making our way across the room to its south- 
west extremity over a varied assortment of 
bowlders and down a drop of eight or ten feet, 



Ozarks and Black Hills. 35 

we crawled into another tight-fitting dry passage 
lined with beautiful glittering onyx like clear 
ice banded with narrow lines of red, of which 
broken fragments covered the narrow floor and 
made a dazzling, but distressingly painful rug 
to crawl over. This is the West Passage and 
leads to the Grand Crevice, of which only a 
small portion has been surveyed ; midway of the 
passage are the Epsom Rooms, two in number, 
and well supplied with epsomiteor native Epsom 
salts; this is sometimes called the Windy Pas- 
sage, on account of a rushing current of air met 
suddenly at the first bend and, no doubt, due to 
the meeting here of fresh air coming in from the 
outside with that chemically changed in the 
Epsom Rooms. 

The cave contains a great many dangerous 
places, as we correctly surmised on the morning 
of our introduction; when Mr. Powell's blessing 
on the breakfast was lost in so fervent a prayer 
for the safe and successful accomplishment of 
our undertaking, it seemed inconsiderate not to 
present the reassuring appearance of inexhaust- 
ible endurance. 

In the Corridor can be seen one of the three 
'old Spanish ladders found in the cave when it 
was rediscovered; but when and for what pur- 
pose the Spaniards used the cave there seems to 
be no means of finding out. It should be 
remembered that this part of the United States 



36 Cave Regions of the 

was occupied first by the Spaniards and then by 
the French, and is a portion of the Louisiana 
Purchase, a tract of 897,931 square miles, or 
70,000 square miles more than the original thir- 
teen states. The price asked and paid was 
$12,000,000 and the assumption of claims which 
citizens of this country had against the French 
Government for about $3,750,000 more. The 
French offered to make the sale on account of 
being thoroughly discouraged vrith constant 
troubles arising with the Indians, whom they had 
decided it would be impossible to persuade or 
compel to recognize any laws other than those 
established by each tribe for itself, or accepted by 
friendly treaty with the council and disregarded 
by individuals on both sides: — and the United 
States accepted the offer, not for any expected 
value in the land, but for the unrestricted naviga- 
tion of the Mississippi River. Therefore Missouri 
was never under British rule and never changed 
hands by force of arms. 

But to return to the Spanish ladder, it is a 
tall pine tree notched on the sides for stops, and 
the stump of a branch left or a peg inserted at 
considerable intervals, for hand supports to as- 
sist in raising the weight of the body. 

Returning to the Auditorium, we entered a 
passage behind the Great White Throne and 
started on what might well be called the Water 
Route, for no dry spot is touched on the round 



Ozarks and Black Hills. 37 

trip ; but if one goes prepared for such a jour- 
ney it is well worth the effort and the mud. If 
the visitor is a man, the suit worn should be one 
he is ready to part with, or overalls ; ladies re- 
ceive the same advice even to the overalls, as 
some of the most beautiful portions of the cave, 
which we failed to see, can be visited only in 
that objectionable costume. To visit any cave 
comfortably a short dress is necessary and if 
any thing like a thorough knowledge of the 
ramifications is desired, the unavoidable climb- 
ing will soon prove the superior claims of a di- 
vided skirt ; but if it is properly made, only the 
wearer need be conscious of the divide. Rub- 
ber boots and water-proof protection for the 
head and shoulders complete a costume that is 
not exactly an artistic creation, unless our 
ideas of art have been gathered in the school of 
Socrates, but it is suited to the requirements of 
the occasion and makes the explorations far 
more easy and profitable than they otherwise 
could be. 

The passage back of the White Throne is 
called the Serpentine Passage, and most of it is 
sufiieiently high for traveling in an erect posi- 
tion; yet there are several places that require 
crawling. The first stopping point is the Gulf 
of Doom Room, or as it is also known, the Reg- 
ister Room, because here visitors usually write 
their names in the peculiar dark red clay, 



38 Cave Meg ions of the 

which is moist but firm and cuts with a polish. 
This room is twenty-five feet high and fifty feet 
wide, and looks off into the Gulf of Doom, 
which seems rightly named when a rock is 
thrown into it and you note the lapse of time 
before any sound returns ; and when the awful 
Gulf is made visible by lights thrown in, one 
involuntarily seeks a firmer footing and clings 
to a projecting rock. The height of the Gulf 
is ninety-five feet and the distant sound of fall- 
ing water is not reassuring. The walls are not 
smoothly worn away, but have the rough and 
weird appearance of having been torn by a 
torrent in a narrow mountain gorge, and arc 
stained with the dark clay. 

Retracing our steps a short distance, if that 
stj^le of locomotion could be called steps, we 
turned into Dore's Gallery, and surely that 
artist was in his usual working mood when he 
conceived this awful method of connecting the 
upper regions with the lower. Great bowlders 
have fallen down without helping to fill the 
black holes that received them, and into this real 
Inferro we proceeded to descend by narrow, 
ladder-like stairs provided with a light hand rail, 
and trembling slightly with the responsibility 
they assumed. If any one's courage trembled 
too, no notice was taken of it, and a record of 
exploring experiences does not necessaril}^ include 
a confession of any doubts. 



Ozarks and Black Hitls. 39 

On all the ladders in this Gallery was a fine 
white fungus growth in the form of a thick, 
heavy mould, that the lightest touch destroyed. 
In eaves where some care is taken to protect 
this mold, it attains a growth of six or more feet 
and assumes the forms of sea- weed. 

Once down the first and longest flight of 
stairs, without any signs of a Dore dragon rais- 
ing its huge body by heavy claws to a resting 
place among the rocks, awe divides more evenly 
with admiration ; and being already well be- 
smeared with mud, we climbed over the clay- 
covered bowlders and crawled through narrow 
holes with perfect satisfaction, enjoying each 
novel scene to the utmost. 

Off from the Dore Gallery is a small chamber 
containing the Fountain of Youth, that must be 
seen, but the way, like that of the transgressor, 
is hard. Arrived at the entrance we hesitated 
a moment, for although getting in looked possible, 
the way out again seemed not so simple ; but 
finally trusting to Providence, through the direct 
agency of our careful guardians, of course, we 
sat down on the edge of the large slippery 
bowlder on which we stood, and reaching out 
caught a projection of the wall on one side and 
a bowlder crag on the other, swung off and 
dropped into the soft mud below. This chamber 
I)roved to be a little gem; small but high, and 
beautifully adorned with calcite crystal. Down 



40 Cave Regions of the 

a wall of red onyx on one side clear water flows 
into a basin in the irregular, rocky floor, just 
behind the bowlder we had used for a hand-rest 
at the entrance; the perfectly transparent water 
in the basin appears to be only a few inches deep, 
but measures three feet, and is several degrees 
colder than the air, which in this portion of the 
cave is warm. The other wall of this room is 
an almost perpendicular bank of the soft dark 
red clay, in which small selenite crystals are 
sprouting like plants in a garden. 

Su.ddenly we heard a heavy, rolling noise like 
distant thunder, and asking if it were possible 
to hear a thunder storm so far below the surface, 
were told it was the protest of angry bats against 
a further advance on the quarters to which tliey 
have retreated from the main body of the cave, 
and their orders were obeyed: so of what may be in 
that direction, we gained no positive kno\\ ledge 
besides bats, and the fact that, small as they are, 
their great numbers make them dangerous when 
angry. Returning to the gallery and continuing 
the journey down over slippery rock and 
slender ladders M'C came at length to the bottom 
of the Gulf of Doom, into which we had looked 
from the room now high above us; and we 
needed no stimulating help to the imagination to 
pronounce it a fit termination to an artit-t's 
troubled dream. 




> 



Ozarks and Black Hills. 41 

Then climbing over au assortment of bowl- 
ders of all sizes, going up a little, and swinging 
or sliding down, we came to a point in the nar- 
row passage where the floor is a fiat slab, like a 
large paving stone, tilted up at a steep angle 
against one wall and not reaching the other by 
about fifteen inches, with darkness of unknown 
depth below: about three feet above this opening 
the wall projects in a narrow, shelving ledge, an d 
everything is covered with a thin coating of 
slippery wet clay. The only way to cross that 
uninviting bridge is to brace the f ee t against the 
slab, and leaning on the ledge, slowly work 
across. A little more rough work and the descent 
of the two short ladders, brought us, at last, 
under the beautiful Waterfall, where we stood 
as in a heavy shower of rain at the lowest point 
3^et reached in the cave, which according to the 
survey of Mr. Prince is four hundred feet 
below the surface. The falling water has 
ornamented the walls, which in this portion 
o f the cave expose over two hundred 
feet of Magnesian Limestone, with 
unique forms of dripstone; and the steeply 
sloping floor has received the over-charge of 
calcium carbonate until it has become a shining 
mass of onyx, retaining pools of cold, transpa-' 
rent water in the depressions. In the lowest' 
corner there is only mud, and above it rises, to 



42 Cave Regions. 

a height of at least fifteen feet a bank of miry, 
yellow clay, at the top of which a hole in the 
wall is the only known entrance to Blondy's 
Throne. 




9 I) ft Q -^^ 



. B c o £ 



F C H 



T'-Dti:h 'A/«. 



5? ;0 ^ 



/ Z 3 







jLoft- n,ve.i- Cc^r^Cot^ 




^'Mfc.Uv,.^ /«?..-, 







d^ "^ -"^^ Ttf S^- ii "^^^ S "^ IP^<5^ c^^^'TS? -^^^ ^^-^ ^ ^ 



-VI /I 



^4 

t> t- h- o- H /, f\^ I. r~-\, r~: '■> P <a., Ki i r 

Longitudinal and Cross-Sections of Passages in Marble Cave, Stone Co., Missouri. 



a^/s/a-rf^s aa_f/Vi- ' 



Plotted by Fred Prince, 1894. 



CHAPTER III. 

MARBLE CAVE CONTINUED. 

On account of the long "crawl" through 
mud and cold water, it was at first suggested 
and then strongly advised, that we should not 
undertake to make the trip to Blondy's Throne: 
and yearning to see what is considered the cave's 
chief beauty was not easy to over-come, but after 
careful attention to the deep mire of the 
approach the advice seemed good, especially as 
Mr. Powell kindly promised to write a descrip- 
tion of its trials and treasures; which he 
promptly did, thereby making it possible for us 
to continue the journey now without a disap- 
pointing interruption, so we will proceed to 
wade that mud bank with him in his own way. 
He says : "As Mecca is to the Mohammedan, so 
is Blondy's Throne Room to the pilgrim who 
invades the chaos and penetrates the mysteries 
of Marble Cave. When the subject is mentioned 
to the guide, he shrugs his shoulders and assumes 
an imploring look, and begins at once to men- 
tion the difficulties of getting there. But if you 
insist upon it he will go. The passage by which 
this room has to be reached, if passage it may 

43 



44 Cave Beyions of the 

be called, must be entered from the Waterfall 
Room, and a steep ascent must be made until an 
elevation of fifty feet is reached above the bot- 
tom of that room. This ascent has beeu called 
Hughse's Slide, as a man of that name once lost 
his footing at the top and slid on the wet and 
very slippery clay all the way to the- bottom, 
leaving a very sleek trail. The ascent is diffi- 
cult, as the soft clay is deep and wet and the 
sides are reeking and covered also with 
soft yielding clay. When the top of the slide 
is once reached, a low passage six feet wide 
and two feet high is discovered, and stooping 
low, or actually lying flat down, you enter. 
The top of the passage is of smooth rock and the 
bottom is of wat clay with an occasional varia- 
tion of sharp gravel. The air is good, and as a 
lizard, you start forward. In places the passage 
widens to ten or twelve feet and again iiarrows 
to six feet. 

"In about one hundred feet you encounter a 
small pond of water filling the whole width of 
the passage and extending twenty to thirty feet, 
but the guide tells you it is only one foot deep, 
and calls attention to the fact that the water 
does not come within a foot of the roof of the 
passage and you can easily keep 3'our chin above 
it, and with this assurance through you go. 

"Within the next one hundred ftet you 
encounter and pass in the same manner three 



Ozarks and Black Hills. 45 

more ponds of varying sizes. The guide calls 
your attention to the fact that you are not alone, 
and looking about you by the dim light of your 
candle you see numbers of small eyeless salaman- 
ders, from four inches to one foot long. They 
are peaceable and harmless, appear to have no 
teeth and are easily caught, if you so desire. 

"Another hundred feet and the Eest Room, or 
Egyptian Temple is reached, and rising to your 
feet you may rest. The room is small, but con- 
tains beautifully fluted walls, resembling basal- 
tic columns ; and natural marks of erosion that 
resemble hieroglyphic inscriptions. From the 
other side of this room the passage goes on with 
the same characteristics, but as you enter to go 
foi'v/ard a sound strikes the ear, and you pause 
to listen. It is a confusion of sounds, a babel 
of voices ; and sounds like a distant conversation 
carried on by a large number of people. So 
striking is this resemblance that you instantly 
ask the guide if there are people in the room 
ahead, and hardly believe him when he says, 
'No.' 

"You hear voices of men, voices of boys, babies, 
girls and ladies, and occasionally loud laughter; 
but forward is the word and on you go, encour- 
aged by the assurance of the guide that you are 
now over half way through the passage and that 
the sounds came from Blondy's Throne Room. 
Suddenly the passage divides into two much 



46 Cave Regions of the 

alike, and taking the right hand one, you make 
your slow advance until at last, with clothes 
soaked and covered with clay mud, and your 
strength about gone, you begin to feel desperate 
and tell the guide that you will go no further, 
when you see him rise to his feet, and he says : 
' Here we are.' You step over a steep bank of 
clay and emerge into a large room. It is almost 
square in shape; about eighty feet long and sixty 
feet wide, and about fifty feet high, with 
white, smooth walls and a pure white ceiling, 
and sloping gradually downward on the left ends 
in a small, clear lake of water. This lake has a 
beautiful beach of white pebbles, and though 
shallow on the edge seems quite deep at the 
center; in fact it is believed to have there a 
concealed opening that gives exit to its waters. 
On the opposite side from you, a stream of clear 
water pours into the lake, and in doing so it 
gives off the sounds that in the passage you mis- 
took for human voices ; and this noble stream 
has been named Mystic River. It enters the 
lake from under a beautiful natural arch, about 
thirty feet across at the bottom, and six feet 
above the water at the center. The bed of the 
stream is eroded from strata of sandstone that is 
extremely hard, containing corundum, and so 
perfect is its continuity that it conveys sound 
distinctly for a distance far beyond the reach of 
the human voice, when tapped upon with a 



Ozarks and Black Hills. 47 

hammer. The top of the arch is studded with 
lovely stalactites, clear as glass, that extend to 
the outer edge of the arch and form massive and~ 
beautiful groups there. Above the arch is a 
large opening. In truth the side of the room is 
out, and a great dark space appears like a cur- 
tain of black. A natural path leads up over one 
side of the arch, and following the lead of the 
guide you go up above and learn that a room 
on the higher level extends off in that direction 
and gets larger and higher. The walls are 
stalagmitic columns in cream color and decked in 
places with blood-red spots or blotches of Titanic 
size. The ceiling you cannot see. -It is too high for 
the lights you have to reach. On the left you are 
suddenly confronted by a stalagmitic formation 
so large and so grand that all others are dwarfed 
into insignificance. You think, of the dome of 
the Capitol at Washington. You are standing 
at the sloping base but cannot see the top. 
Just here the guide announces in an awestruck 
voice "Blondy's Throne." And who is Blondy? 
Only a fair-haired, blue-eyed, intrepid and 
daring fifteen-year-old boy, named Charles 
Smallwood, who assisted the writer in exploring 
the cave in the early days of 1883, and going 
on in advance, reported back that he had found 
another and a greater throne than the Great 
White Throne in the Auditorium. 

' 'Well, here We are at Blondy's Throne at last, 



48 Cave Regions of the 

and surveying the base, we find that it is 
actually only half in the room we are in ; the 
other half forms the side of another room. In 
a word, the Great Throne divides the room into 
two parts and makes two rooms of it instead of 
one. Yet the one half of the base has a meas- 
urement, by tape line, of one hundred and fifty 
feet. The guide now makes preparations to 
ascend the Throne. A chain has been fastened 
up towards the top, and by taking hold of this 
the climb can be made up the sloping sides of the 
Throne. We pass on and up over the clearest 
and most ice-like formation, resembling the great 
icebergs seen at sea. Reaching an elevation of 
sixty feet an opening into the dome is found, 
and stooping, you enter. It is a room about 
twenty feet across, with a white ice-like floor, a 
roof or ceiling ten feet above, and from it hang 
thousands of brilliant stalactites and from the 
floor stalagmites rise up to meet them. They 
are in all sizes, from an inch to two feet across. 
The sides are of the same material joined and 
cemented lightly together. Strike any of them 
and clear musical notes are given off ; a musician 
has found two full octaves. AVater is dripping 
in many places, and in the center of the floor is 
a tank full of clear water. It is four feet wide, 
twelve feet long and of unknown depth. 

"On the opposite side of the room from which 
you enter there is a hole or opening in the wall. 




Blondy's Thbone. 
Page 47. 



Ozarks and Black Hills. 49 

It is large enough to go through but it goes into 
the great dark room on the other side of the 
Throne. An abyss confronts you, a sheer preci- 
pice which descends for many feet, perhaps hun- 
dreds. No man knows. This outer room of" 
Blondy's Tlirone has been named the Chamber of 
the Fairies. Leaving it. and continuing the 
ascent, the top of the Throne is soon reached 
and is about twenty feet across; and from 
several points still higher, rise stalagmitic 
spires, 

"The actual height of Blondy's Throne is not 
known, but is probably about one hundred feet. 
Again look upwards for the ceiling from the 
dizzy height on top of the Throne; you cannot 
see it. Burn magnesium ribbon and look up, 
and you see a white ceiling spangled with groups 
of stalactites. It is surely one hundred feet 
away. Then look off into the unknown room 
which is called the Great Beyond. No human 
being has ever explored or even entered it, but 
fire balls thrown in reveal the fact that it is of 
great extent; and part of the bottom water and 
part land. No way of getting into it has ever 
yet been found, so its mysteries, lessons and 
revelations are still safe from human intrusion. 
How far it goes, where it stops, and what 
it leads to, are facts for some future ex- 
plorer to discover. Bats and white salaman- 
ders are found in Blondy's Throne Room, and 



50 Cave Regions of the 

some larger animals have been heard to jump 
into the water and escape on the approach of 
man, but their species is not known. 

" The arched passage of Mystic River has been 
followed up for a journey of an hour, but fur- 
ther than that its extent is unknown. It was 
hoped that a way would be thus found into the 
Great Beyond, but it did not prove successful. 
A well equipped party could find there a chance 
for some grand discoveries, and it would be one 
of the notable pleasures of the life of the writer 
to be one of such a party. 

"The exit from Blondy's Throne Room is al- 
ways made with deep i-egret that the waning 
lights and meager supplies will not allow a lon- 
ger sta}^ The long crawl, the mud and the wa- 
ter are all forgotten, and notwithstanding the 
terror of the trip one feels well repaid." 

We thank Mr. Powell for a charming jomuey 
without its discomfort and danger, and re- 
sume our travels at the Waterfall, 

From the foot of the Waterfall we returned 
again to the Auditorium, in time to enjoy a 
sight such as we supposed could exist only in a 
brilliant imagination; and the return at that 
hour was not a lucky accident of fate, but the 
result of careful attention to a prearranged de- 
sign that we should not fail to witness a mar- 
velous display never surpassed by lavish Na- 




'—* OS 
r^ n. 




Foot of Waterfall. 
Page 50. 



Ozarks and Black Hills, 51 

ture. The day outside was one of cloudless 
summer sunshine. 

Our eyes having grown accustomed to the dim 
light of candles in passages where absolute 
darkness, unrelieved by the stars of midnight, 
always reigns, the great Auditorium appeared 
before us softly flooded with daylight diffused 
from a broad white beam slanting down in Ijng 
straight lines from the entrance as from a rift in 
heavy clouds ; only this rift displayed around 
its edges a brilliant border of vegetation that 
the rough rocks cherish with tender care. 

As we stood lost in almost speechless admira- 
tion, and without the slightest warning of treas- 
ure yet in store, the white beam was stabbed by 
a narrow, gleaming shaft of yellow sunlight. 
The glorious, radiant beauty of the picture pre- 
sented is utterly indescribable, but it was of 
short duration, and in a few seconds the golden 
blade was withdrawn as suddenly as it had ap- 
peared. 

If the genius of Elkins had been granted the 
privilege we enjoyed, the artist-world of Eu- 
rope that graciously yielded the highest honor 
to his "Sunbeam on Mount Shasta," would 
have knelt in rapturous humility. Speaking of 
his great work, as we stood before it only a few 
months before his death, Mr. Elkins said qui- 
etly: "It is no great achievement; I simply 



52 Cave Regions of the 

painted it exactly as it looked. An3^one could 
do the same." But no one ever has. 

The white beam was more enduring and by its 
aid we were able to view the expanse of the 
great Auditorium far better than could have 
been done in the momentary glare of any bril- 
liant artificial light. Every part of the cloud- 
gray walls shows a stratification as regularly 
horizontal as if the laying of each course had 
been done with the assistance of line and level; 
while in every direction are now seen hundreds 
of stalactites that had not been noticed before, 
and although they look small, the average 
length, taken with the surveying instruments, 
is foui'teen feet. The Hill beneath the entrance 
is an accumulation of debris, drifted in from the 
outside, and rising to a height of more than 
one hundred and twenty-five feet; while the 
great circumference of its supporting base, re- 
vealed by the banishment of shadows, suggests 
the possibility of tragic history of which the 
only evidence lies buried there and may or may 
not ever be discovered; but let us step lightly, 
since our feet may press the covering that shields 
a final sleep; and also let a grieving sister in 
her old age take comfort in the knowledge that 
here, as in few other spots, nature provides a 
certain and gentle burial for the unfortunate, 
and for a few seconds each daylights the dim 
chamber with a heavenly glory — perhaps in 



Ozarks and Black Hills. 53 

appeal to the sons of one country to harbor no 
such feelings as deprived Abel of life and for 
all time and eternity tarnished the honor of 
Cain. 

The chilliness presently recalled us from fur- 
ther indulgence in that great scene, to ordinary 
affairs ; and consulting the reliable thermom- 
eter, it was found to register 42°, while in some 
of the lower passages the temperature is 58° ; 
but the variation is not in accordance with the 
accepted theory of one degree to the one hun- 
dred feet descent. 

A return to the beautiful Sj)ring of Youth 
Room was now a necessity, but we were care- 
ful to allow no drop of water falling from clay- 
stained hands to reach the purity of that lovely 
bowl, and then being happy and hungry, we re- 
tired to the piano's protecting tent for refresh- 
ment. 

The atmosphere in Marble Cave has the pecu- 
liar bracing and invigorating quality common 
to the majority of caves, that seems almost to 
defy fatigue and encourage exertion that under 
ordinary conditions would be impossible. 

After the exertion necessary in the warmer 
portions of the cave, the temperature of 42° 
proved rather low for comfort and finally was 
admitted to be a sufficient reason for either 
leaving the cave or sending out for the wraps. 
Slowly and reluctantly the party walked up the 



54 (Jave Regions of the 

long winding path to the summit of the Hill 
where the stairwaj- finds support, stopping 
nianj times to admire again the perfect curves 
and fine color-tones of that wonderful high 
arch — within a mountain yet softly radiant with 
the light of day. 

Still lingering regretfully among the fern- 
decked rocks before quite finishing the ascent to 
the actual outside world, the mercury lost little 
time in registering eighty degrees. 

Since no ofticial, or even approximately cor- 
rect map of Marble Cave has yet been published, 
and the desirability of maps is particularly urg- 
ed by Monsieur E. A. Martel, a special effort was 
made to secure one, w^hich was accompanied by 
the following remarks from Mr. Prince in regard 
to its incompleteness : 

" There are several passages and rooms which 
do not appear on the map, though some of them 
are well known, but have not been surveyed and 
platted. 

"Much further exploration is possible in this 
great cavern. Lost River Canon ends abruptly 
in a bank of red clay, the volume of water being 
undiminished. The water from the Great Fall 
Hows by a small serpertine into a passage which 
has never been followed up ; its entrance being 
several hundred feet higher that the nearest 
water level." 

Unfortunately the quantity of water in the 



Ozarks and Black Hills. 55 

cave at the time of the visit just described was 
so unusually great as to render the Lost River 
Canon trip impossible. 

During the previous season the cave and its 
surroundings were visited by a prominent natur- 
alist who appears to have been delightfully lib- 
eral in the diffusion of scientific knowledge and 
the axplanations of methods of pursuing inves- 
tigations. His practical instruction in snake 
catching is particularly interesting as it was 
never before introduced into this state, where the 
copperhead and rattler are known to have sur- 
vived among the fittest. Seeing a snake hole 
and desiring information as to the family record 
of the proprietor, he -inserted a finger, and while 
waiting for results explained that there is no 
better way to secure a specimen, as the enraged 
reptile will fasten its fangs into the intruding 
member and then can be easily withdrawn. 
It is a pleasure to state that even snakes recog- 
nize the claims of friendship, and no injury was 
experienced. * 

In the vicinity of Marble Cave there are sev- 
eral choice varieties of onyx and marble, among 
them a rare and beautiful onyx in black and 
yellow. The coloring, tinting and banding 
of onyx seem generally to be regarded as one of 
the unexplainable mysteries of nature, but is in 

" The naturalist referred to is the late Prof. £. D. Cope. 



56 Cave Regions of the 

reality an extremely simple process that can be 
easily studied in any active cave. 

When the percolating acidulated water passes 
slowly through a pure limestone it is filtered of 
impurities and deposits a crystal, either pure 
white or transparent; if it comes in contact 
with metallic bodies of any kind, it carries 
away more or less in solution to act as coloring 
matter ; the beautiful pale green onyx in sev- 
eral Missouri counties taking its tint from the 
copper; in South Dakota, manganese in various 
combinations produces black and many shades 
of brown ; in both states an excessive flow of 
water often carries a quantity of red or yellow 
clay which temporarily destroys the beauty of 
exposed surfaces, but in after years becomes a 
fine band of brilliant color. 

Small wind caves are numerous in the Ozarks 
and being cold are frequently utilized for the 
preservation of domestic supplies. The entrance 
to one in the neighborhood of Marble Cave is 
high up on the hillside south of Mr. Powell's 
house and being visible from the porch was too 
tempting to be ignored, and the walk up to it 
for a better view was rewarded with a most 
charming bit of scenery as well. All the quiet 
valley, divided by a rushing little stream, lay 
before us in the shadow of early evening, while 
to the north and east the hills were brilliant in 
summer sunshine, with one small open glade 




Entrance to Cave — Interior View. 

Page 52. 



Ozarks and ^lack Hills. 5T 

gleaming vividly among the darker shades of 
forest green. 

The cave was a very small room at the bottom 
of a steep, rocky, sloping passage, and contained 
no standing water, although there had been a 
heavy rainfall the night before and the opening 
is so situated as to especially favor the inflow, 
which naturally indicates a greater cave 
beneath a hidden passage. Here, as in most of 
the caves of the region, is found a small lizard: 
it is totally blind but its ancestors evidently 
were not, as is shown by conspicuous protuber- 
ances where the eyes should be, but over which 
the skin is drawn without a wrinkle or seam to 
indicate a former opening. These harmless 
creatures are not scaly, but are clothed in a soft, 
shining, well-fitted skin, and the largest seen 
were little more than six inches long. 

Those who love perfect Nature in a most smil- 
ing mood should hasten to visit Marble Cave 
while yet no rail-road quite touches the county. 



CHAFER IV. 

FAIRY CAVE AND VOAVELL CAVE. 

Fairy Cave enjoys the reputation of being the 
most beautiful yet discovered in that cavernous 
region, and consequent!}^ a visit to it was con- 
templated with considerable eagerness, although 
the mode of entrance had been described with 
sufficient accuracy to prevent any misconcep- 
tion of the difficulties to be overcome or the 
personal risk involved. To go from our tempo- 
rary abiding place it was necessary to pass 
Marble Cave, and when we had gone that 
far Mr. Po'A'ell left us to follow the road, while 
he, on his mule, took a short cut across the hills 
and valleys, to try to find men not too much oc- 
cupied with their own aiTairs on a fine Monday 
morning, in corn plowing time, to join our expe- 
dition. As neither our small companion. Merle, 
nor ourselves, had any knowledge of the locality 
of our destination, we were carefully instructed 
to follow the main road to the Wilderness 
Ridge, and keeping to that, pass the Indian 
Creek road and all others that are plain, 
but turn down the second dim road and follow 
it until stopped by a new fence where we would 

68 



Ozarks and Black Mills. 59 

be met and conducted. So long as points to be 
passed held out, these directions gave us no 
trouble whatever, even the first dim road offer- 
ing no obstacle to the pleasure of our progress; 
but the second dim road proved so elusive we 
traveled many miles in search of it, finally 
bringing up against a place Merle was familiar 
with and knew to be a long way off the track of 
our intentions. As there was nothing to be done 
but return we naturally accepted the situation 
and did that ; presently finding Mr. Powell and 
the Messrs Irwin, on whose land the cave is, 
patiently waiting for us in what was really not 
a road at all, but rather, in this region of fossils, 
the badly preserved impression of one long since 
extinct. 

The new fence was oj)ened at two places that 
we might drive through and be saved the exer- 
tion of walking a considerable distance, then 
the horses were left in the shade while we scram- 
bled down the steep hill-side covered with sharp- 
edged, broken rock, about mid- way down which 
is the mouth of the cave, yawning like a narrow, 
open well. Above this a stout windlass has been 
arranged on two forked logs. 

A few feet below the surface the cave spreads 
out jug-shaped, so that in descending nothing 
is touched until the floor is reached, one hundred 
feet beneath the surface ; consequently the only 
danger to be apprehended is a fall. 



60 Cave tiegions of the 

Each of the three men present kindly olFercd 
to go down and make the exploration -with mi% 
but that would have left onl^^ two at the wind- 
lass, and for a man's weight, safety requires four. 
Should an accident occur, assistance would be 
necessary, and some time lost in finding it; so, 
to the undisguised satisfaction of one and equally 
evident relief of the others, it was reluctantly 
decided that the trip must be given up, and 
therefore we are indebted to the kindness of 
Captain Powell* for the following description of 
Fairy Cave: 

"The Cave referred to is situated in Section 
24, Township 23, Range 23, in Stone County, 
Missouri, and is on the homestead of one of three 
brothers named Irwin. 

"It was accidentally discovered in the 3'ear 1895 
and up to the time of this writing (June 189(5) 
only six persons have ever entered it. It is in a 
point or spur of the Ozark Mountains which runs 
to the east from the great Wilderness Ridge, and 
is three miles distant from the Marble Cave. 
Having been one of the first to enter the Cave, 
being called by the owner as a sort of cave 
expert, I will attempt to describe both the adven- 
ture and the cave just as the}' were. The meas- 
urements are simply estimated, though by long 
practice I have become expert in that line also, 

♦Editor of the county news-paper. 



Ozarks and Black Hills. 61 

but the longest measurement here was correctly- 
taken by the rope used. 

"Having been invited by the Irwin brothers to 
come and examine and explore a new cave they 
had found but had only entered and not explored, 
accompanied by my eldest son, W. T. Powell, I 
reached the place one warm Saturday morning. 
We found about twelve or fourteen men waiting 
for our coming ; some discussing the matter of 
whether we would enter when we did come, and 
others who had volunteered to work the windlass, 
which had been erected over the opening, by 
means of Avhich,with a one hundred foot rope, en- 
trance was to be made. The opening was like a 
small well, and situated under the edge of an 
overhanging cliff of marble, and on the southeast 
slope of the mountain, about one hundred and 
fifty feet above the bottom of a narrow valley, 
and about the same distance below the top of 
the mountain, which here is three hundred feet 
high. In order to rig a windlass the edge of 
the cliff had to be broken away. The well-like 
opening descended for about ten feet through 
strata of flat-laying rocks that formed a roof ; 
then all appeared to be vacancy and a stone 
cast in gave back a distant sound. 

"Having first tested the air and proved it good 
by dropping in blazing excelsior saturated with 
turpentine, a stout oak stick was attached to the 
end of the rope, my son sprang astride and was 



62 Cave Regions of the 

lowered to the bottom, just one hundred feet. 
He reported back 'All right.' On the return of 
the rope I took my position on the stick and was 
soon dangling in mid air. The sensation was 
strange and exhilarating. Looking up I could 
only see the small opening I came through, and 
a straggling stream of light poured down that, 
but on all sides profound darkness reigned su- 
preme. A spark-like light my son lit, reminded 
me of the lost Pleiad. About twenty-five or 
thirty feet from the top I caught sight of a scene 
that made me call on the men at the windlass to 
stop. 

"This caused them to think something was 
going wrong and one called out to know what 
was the matter : I heard him say 'He is weaken- 
ing.' I assured them everything was right 
only I wanted to take a view; so they stopped. 
Off at a distance of perhaps twenty-five feet was 
an opening about ten feet or more wide and 
twelve feet high. The light from the opening 
struck it fairly, owing to the position of the 
sun at the time. Through this opening I saw 
into another room, large and magnificent. It 
brought to mind the White City. It was snowy 
white, and thickl}-^ studded with stalactites and 
stalagmites of immense size and in great num- 
bers; some looking like spires of numerous 
churches, and manj'^ connected as with a lattice- 
work about the bottom. For a short time I 



Ozarks and Black Hills. 63 

gazed on that lovely scene, and examined the 
chances to reach it, bnt a great gulf intervened 
that we had no means of spanning, and I called 
to the men to lower me down. Approaching the 
bottom one of the walls trended in towards me 
and I stepped upon solid ground close to the 
wall, which half way up seemed fifty feet away. 
The opening above now looked like a small pale 
moon, and the next man who came dangling 
down to Join us looked no bigger than a toy 
soldier. Gradually our eyes became accustomed 
to the twilight, and by the time our part}'- was 
increased to six men, I could see quite distinctly. 
"The room runs directly into the mountain and 
is about ninety feet high, and where we landed 
it proved to be twenty feet wide. It extended 
in both directions, but much the farthest tov/ards 
the right hand. The outer room is encrusted in 
fine white water formations. It forms a Gothic 
ceiling from which hang pendant at all places 
brilliant and sparkling stalactites; some being 
of immense size and length, from ten to twenty- 
five feet. Others are not so large but are bril- 
liant. We created a flood of artificial light with 
dozens of candles and lamps; and then and not 
until then, could we see the slope and contour 
of the roof. A few bats were flitting about, 
disturbed for the first time. To the left, a vast 
white pillar extended from floor to roof. It was 
pure white and about five feet in diameter all 



64 Cave Begions of the 

the way up. It was fluted, fretted, draped and 
spangled. I never in my life saw anything more 
chaste and lovely. I thought of the countless 
ages it must have taken to form that monument: 
of the streams of clear water that had fallen and 
left their calcite deposits, while it grew year 
after year, age after age, century after century, 
in this profound darkness, disturbed by no noises 
save the rhythmic sound of the falling drops and 
the dull flitting of the bats, who alone were the 
living witnesses of its construction. To the rear 
of this great pillar the room is divided into 
three galleries, one above another. With great 
difficulty and much danger we climbed into each 
of these. The floors were all like the pillar of 
pure white onyx, and extended back a distance 
of thirty or more feet. The floor of one formed 
the roof of another. They were brilliant with 
hanging pendants and the side walls were all 
veneered with the same white and crystalline 
formation. To entirely describe them is im- 
possible. A day in each would still leave the 
observer short of words in which to tell of the 
wonders. 

"Turning towards the right hand from the 
entrance we advance two hundred feet up an 
incline of dry clay, the room widening gradually 
until its width is forty feet, when we reach the 
top of an elevation thirty feet above the starting 
point, where a sudden steep descent brings us to 



Ozarks and Black Hills. 65 

a halt. A stone cast down strikes water and the 
sound of a splash comes back to us. With 
caution we seek our way down the hill and stand 
on the edge of a small lake or pond. Suddenly 
my son, who is in the lead, rushes back saying: 
'Look out! I put my hand on a snake.' Some 
of us, being armed with hickory canes that had 
been thrown down, concentrated our lights and 
advanced. Sure enough, there is a snake a yard 
long coiled up on a section of rotten wood. It 
proves to be a copperhead, the most quarrelsome 
and vicious snake in this country ; but his nature 
is changed so that he makes no effort to fight 
and is killed with a blow, and is sent to be 
hoisted up that we may examine him in daylight. 
No others were found, and probably he had 
fallen in at the opening, and spent a long, weary 
time in expiation of his upper-earth crimes. 

" Examining the lake we find it to be about 
forty feet wide and the same long, and it fills 
the room from wall to wall. We cannot pass it 
so must either stop or wade through. We decide 
to wade, and on measuring the water find it only 
two or three feet deep, with a soft clay bottom, 
and in many places islands of stalagmite rise 
above the surface. 

' 'On the sides of the lake there are formations 
in the shape of sofas and lounges, and they ap- 
pear to be cushioned, but the cushions are found 
to be hard, solid rock. As the lights advance 



66 Cave Eegions of the 

across the lake new wonders are revealed. 
Curtains and draperies hanging from the top 
almost touch the water and entirely cut off the 
view beyond. Passing under a curtain at one of 
the highest places, we emerge from the lake, and 
once more on dry land, advance up a slope. 
Here the water formations have taken human 
shapes of all sizes and several colors now appear 
and help to present a chaos of beauty. 

"Two hundred feet more and the chamber ends 
in a vast waterfall, but the water has turned to 
stone. Above the waterfall is an opening, but 
it is twenty-five feet up a smooth wall and we 
have no ladder. The journey was at an end. 
Tired, wet and muddy, we started on our return 
trip ; recrossed the dark lake, and retraced our 
steps to the place under the opening without 
realizing that we had spent six hours under 
ground. While the other members of the party, 
and the specimens, were being raised to the sur- 
face, the writer sought to learn the flora and 
fauna of this new region. The flora is blank. 
Even the white mold so common in many caves 
is absent; and no fungus grows on the poles, 
bark and rotten wood that have at some past 
time been cast in. 

"In animal life the range is greater. I have 
mentioned the ever-present bats, and dozens of 
them were seen. There were also small, white 
eyeless salamanders, small, yellow, speckled sal- 



Ozarks and Black Hilh. 67 

amanders, with signs of eyes but no sight; also 
a Jet blcck salamander, which like the rest, was 
blind. The bats were of tv/o species — the com- 
mon brown bat and the larger light grey or 
yellow species. But this was not the time of the 
year to see many bats in caves. In the summer 
season most of them go out and remain until cool 
weather, and then return to the caves with their 
3'oung; so I was rather surprised to see as many 
as we did. 

"Down comes the rope for the last time, and 
taking my place, I soon feel myself spinning 
around and slowly rising. As I again pass 
the magic city I saw going down, a stronger 
wish than ever takes possession of me to go 
there, and I look for any chance to solve the 
problem of how such a journey can be made. 
'Thou art so near and yet so far.' 

"Suddenly I find myself emerging from the 
ground into a very hot world, with the evening 
sun blazing so that the air feels like the scorch- 
ing heat of an oven ; and my late companions 
are scattered about under the trees, no doubt 
wishing themselves back in the cool regions 
below the hot cliffs. 

''My final conclusions in regard to Fairy Cave 
were that it was about six hundred feet long by 
from fifteen to forty feet wide and from eighty 
to ninety feet high : that in the upper story 
there are rooms that I could not reach, that will 



68 Cave Regions of the 

amply i)ay the scientist and explorer to investi- 
gate in the future: that probably we reached all 
the accessible parts in the level we traveled : 
that the temperature Avas fiftj'-six or very near 
that degree: that small as it is, it contains the 
finest formations and grandest scenery I have 
ever seen in a cave: and I have examined over 
one hundred of various sizes. I believe that for 
interior beauty its equal is not to be found in 
America , and I sincererely believe that the ver- 
dict of future exploration will establish the truth 
of the assertion, but as equally good judges 
differ on such matters, time will be required for 
atrue and just decision. There are yet many prom- 
ising caves to be explored in this region, and if 
my strength holds out a few years I hope to see 
them all. T. S. Powell." 

POWELL CAVE. 

As a measure of consolation for the disap- 
pointment of not seeing the beauty of Fairy 
Cave, Mr. Irwin suggested that only a quarter 
of a mile further on was another, recentlj'^ dis- 
covered and worthy of a visit, although small. 

In that region of steep Inlls and sharp-edged 
rocks, a great amount of travel can be added to 
the experience of a tender-foot in a short distance. 
The quarter of a mile seemed to stretch out in 
some mysterious way as we worked on it, but 
the variety and abundance of attractions are 
more than ample compensation. 



Ozarks and Black Hills. 69 

The view was fine, including as it did the 
deep ravine and grassy, wooded slopes rising 
three hundred feet above, with here and there a 
handsome ledge of marble exposed like the 
nearly bviried ruin of a forgotten temple of 
some past age. Scattered about in great pro- 
fusion among the broken rock on the surface of 
these hill-sides we observed a water deposit of 
iron ore. It is a brown hematite and in some 
cases shows the structure of the bits of wood it 
has replaced. Since this region has from the 
earliest time produced a generous growth of 
vegetation, the decay of which has yielded a 
never-failing supply of acids to assist in carv- 
ing the caves and then in their decoration, the 
presence of the ore is not difficult to account 
for. The whole Ozark uplift being rich in iron, 
the acidulated drainage waters coming into con- 
tact dissolved and took it in solution, to re-de- 
posit where and when conditions should be 
favorable. These conditions were found in the 
basin among the hills and along its outlet. 

In the Popular Science Monthly of January 
1897, a short article by J. T. Donald, entitled 
"A Curious Canadian Iron Mine," describes the 
same thing going on at the present time in Lac 
a la Tortue, a small body of water in the center 
of a tract of swamp land, which produces the 
vegetation necessary to supply the acid required 
for a base of operation. 



70 Cave Regions of the 

Of the manner of deposition he sajs : " The 
solution of iron in vegetable acid (in which the 
iron is in what the chemist calls the form of a 
protosalt) is oxidized by the action of the air on 
the surface of the lake into a persalt, which is 
insoluble, and appears on the surface in patches 
that display the peculiar iridescence character- 
istic of petroleum floating on water. Indeed, 
not infrequently these films of peroxide of iron 
are incorrectly attributed to petroleum. These 
films become heavy by addition of new particles; 
they sink through the water, and in this manner, 
in time, a large amount of iron ore is deposited 
on the lake bottom. It must not be supposed 
that the ore is deposited as a fine mud or sedi- 
ment. On the contrary, in this lake ore, as it 
is called, we have an excellent illustration of 
what is called concretionary action — that is, the 
tendency of matter when in a fine state of divi- 
sion to aggregate its particles into masses about 
some central nucleus, which may be a fragment 
of sunken wood, a grain of sand, or indeed a 
pre-formed small mass of itself." 

It is claimed for this water ore, which is 
gathered like oysters, that mixed with bog ore 
and magnetic iron, and smelted ^vith charcoal, 
the result as obtained is strong, durable and 
high priced. 

The curiously elastic quarter of a mile finally 
yielded to persistent toil, and the cave was 



Ozarhs and MlacTc Hills. 7i 

reached. The entrance is sufficiently broad to 
give a good first impression, and is under a 
heavy ledge of limestone which breaks the slope 
of the hill and is artistically decorated with 
a choice collection of foliage, among which is a 
coral honeysuckle; the fragrant variety gi'ows 
everywhere. Under the ledge is a narrow ves- 
tibule, out of the north end of which is a 
passage about twenty-four inches in width, 
between perpendicular walls, and as steeply 
inclined as the average dwelling-house stairway 
but without any assisting depressions to serve 
as steps. Mr. Irwin cut a grape vine, and making 
one end secure at the entrance, provided a hand 
rail, by the aid of which I was able to easily 
descend the stepless way and afterwards remount. 
The first chamber entered is the principal 
portion of the cave, and by actual measurement 
is forty-nine feet in length by forty-eight in 
greatest width and the height estimated at fifty 
feet. On account of irregularities it appears 
smaller but higher. On opposite sides of the 
chamber, at elevation about midway between the 
floor and ceiling are two open galleries. The floor 
is extremely irregular with its accumulation of 
fallen masses of rock, and the action of water 
has given to portions of the walls the appear- 
ance of pillars supporting the arches of the roof. 
The whole aspect is that of a small Gothic 
chapel. Oif to the northwest is another room 



72 Cave Regions of the 

measuring thirty feet in each direction, and out 
of this are several openings, too small to squeeze 
through, which indicate the possible existence 
of other chambers beyond, but they may be only- 
drain pipes. 

The cave contains no drip formations, notwith- 
standing which it is one of the most charming, 
and when invited to name it I called it Powell 
Cave, in honor of the most ardent admirer of 
caves in that county, and to whom I am much 
indebted for valued assistance. 



CHAPTER V. 

OTHER STONE COUNTY GATES. 
GENTRY CAVE, 

The cave nearest to Galena, and the first 
visited by us, is Gentry Cave, situated a mile 
and a half from town. We started in the mail 
coach, but that vehicle met with a misfortune by 
ro means unusual in that region, the total wreck 
of a wheel. Having only that morning arrived 
from the rich agricultural portion of the State 
where no surface rock can be found, we were 
pleased enough with the prospect of a walk in 
such charming spring weather, and set out with 
a cheerful certainty that the rough place in the 
road would soon be passed. But the school of 
experience is always open for the reception of 
new-comers and we were admitted to full duty 
without question. 

The topography was nearly as broken, in its 
way, as the natural "piking" spread over it, 
and very beautiful with the dense forests lighted 
by the slanting yellow rays of the afternoon sun. 
The way leads up to th* "ridge road" which 
is at length abandoned for no road at all, and 

73 



74 ' Cave Eegions of the 

descending through the forest, more than half 
the distance down to the James River flowing at 
the base of the hill, we come suddenly in view 
of the cave entrance, which is probably one of 
the most magnificent pieces of natural archi- 
tecture ever seen. 

Rounding a corner by a narrow path, we step 
onto a covered portico ninety-seven feet long, 
with an average width of ten feet. The floor is 
smooth and level, as also is the ceiling, which 
is nine feet above, supported by handsomely 
carved pillars and rising in a gray cliff project- 
ing from the slope of the hill above, out to the 
brink of the more abrupt descent to the water's 
edge ninety feet below. Between the pillars 
are three large door-ways into the cave. The 
comparison suggested is an Egyptian temple, 
and the idea is continued within, where there 
are no chambers as in other caves; but instead, 
the entire interior is a labyrinth of passages 
winding about in every direction among an 
uncounted number of low massive pillars, some 
supporting a low ceiling and others connected 
by high arches, the highest point being esti- 
mated at sixty feet, but appearing to be more, 
because the enclosed space rising to a dome is so 
narrow that the point of view is necessarily 
directly underneath. 

All exposed surfaces of pillars and walls inside 
the cave are of clay or a soft porous rock having 



Ozarks and Black Hills. 75 

the same appearance, and are covered with 
curious little raised markings like the indescrib- 
able designs of mixed nothing generally known 
as "Persian patterns." This is, of course, 
easily explained ; the clay being the residuum 
from disintegrated limestone, the markings 
described are the harder portions of the rock 
remaining after particles of clay had been car- 
ried out by flowing water while the disintegrat- 
ing process was yet incomplete. 

The Drinking Fountain is considered th^ great 
attraction of the cave, and appears to have 
been fashioned to suggest a model for the hand- 
some soda fountains belonging to a later joeriod. 
The water bowl is a large depression worn in 
the top of a rock which seems to have been 
built into the wall. In front it is five feet high 
and nine feet across, with artistic corners 
approximately alike, and at the back ornamen- 
tal carving extends upward towards the ceiling 
with an opening through the wall at the center. 
This opening is divided by a short column down 
which water trickles to supply the bowl. The 
ceiling here is about thirty -five feet high and 
most of the exposed surface is a blue-gray lime- 
stone. Only one portion of Gentry Cave 
has received a deposit of dripstone and even 
that is of limited extent, and located at the end 
of a narrow slippery passage between high, 
slippery walls. 



76 Cave Regions of the 

The fine entrance is of grey limestone in un- 
disturbed horizontal strata, and this is so plainly 
marked in the roof-supporting pillars as to give 
them the appearance of having been prepared by 
skillful hands, in several blocks, and afterwards 
arranged in place without the aid of mortar. 
Unfortunately, all efforts to photograph this 
wonderful portico have failed to give satisfac- 
tion — its position above the river being such as 
to afford no point for the proper placing of the 
camera; but a second visit made for the purpose 
of trying was far from being a loss, and part 
of the reward consisted of finding among the 
sheltered rocks, scarcely three feet above the 
floor, two humming birds' nests with tlieir 
treasure of small eggs, and our little companion 
who discovered them was pleased to leave them 
untouched. 

SUGAR TREE HOLLOAV CAVE. 

The name of this cave is due to the fact that 
the approach is through a "hollow" well wooded 
with sugar maple trees. It is two miles from 
Galena and the drive a beautiful one, as much 
of the way is through the forest without a road, 
but with a charming little rushing, crooked 
stream of clear, cold water: and in places the 
green slopes give way to mural bluff's of grey 
limestone in undisturbed strata. 

The entrance to the cave is througli a hole 



Ozarks and Black Hills. 77 

aboiit two feet high by three in width, into 
which we went feet first and wiggled slowly 
down an incline covered with broken rock, for a 
distance of fifteen feet, where a standing depth 
is reached. A flat, straight, level ceiling ex- 
tends over the whole cave without any percep- 
tible variation, and this is bordered around its 
entire length and breadth with a heavy cornice 
of dripstone, made very ornamental by the 
forms it assumes, and the multitude of depend- 
ing stalactites that fall as a fringe around 
the walls. The line of contact between tbe 
cornice and ceiling is as clear and strong as if 
both had been finished separately before the cor- 
nice was put in place by skillful hands. 

Dripstone covers the walls, which vai-y in 
height from one foot to twenty feet, according 
to the irregularities of the floor, just as the 
width of this one-room cave varies with the 
curves of the walls, which are sweeping and 
graceful, the average being twenty-nine feet, 
but is much greater at the entrance where the 
entire slope extends out beyond the body of the 
cave. The length, from north to south, meas- 
ures two hundred and thirty -three feet exclusive 
of an inaccessible extension. 

The south end of the cave rises by a steep 
slope to wathin a foot of the ceiling with which 
it is connected by short but heavy columns of 
dripstone, and another line of pillars of gradu- 



78 Cave Regions of the 

ated height meets this at right angles near the 
middle and ends in an immense stalagmite that 
stands at the foot of the slope like a grand new- 
el post. 

There is no standing water in the cave, but 
everything is wet with drip, and consequently 
the formation of onyx is actively progressing 
and the south slope already mentioned shows a 
curious succession of changes in cave affairs. 
By the slow action of acidulated waters, the 
grey limestone deteriorated into a yellowish 
clay-bank, and now its particles are being re- 
united into solid rock by the deposit of calcium 
carbonate from the drip. 

A careful test of the temperature of the atmos- 
phere showed it to be fifty-eight degrees. 

PINE RUN CAVE. 

This also is a small cave easily visited from 
Galena, being less than two miles distant on the 
Marionville road. The entrance faces the road 
and is on the same level, consequently it is one 
of the easiest to visit. Just within is seen an 
opening in the ceiling, which we are told is one 
of the two ways to an upper chamber whose 
chief attraction is a dripstone piano, and the 
means of ascending is at hand in the form of a 
Spanish ladder; but an attempt oi that sort 
might even cause the new woman to hesitate, 
and who hesitates is lost. Tiie ascent was not 



Ozarks and Black Hills. 79 

made. "We advanced on a level with the road 
for a distance of perhaps twenty feet, when the 
direction of the cave changed with a right an- 
gular turn and we were in a straight gallery 
about two hundred and fifty feet long and 
fifteen feet in width, the height gradually de- 
creasing to about three feet towards the upper 
end, where it widened out into a low but broad 
chamber. The floor of this chamber is most 
beautiful. It is composed of a series of con- 
nected calcite bowls whose beautifully fluted 
rims are of regular and uniform height, and all 
are equally filled with clear, still water. A 
great number of these basins are said to have 
been destroyed by an ax in the hands of a poor 
witless creature for the gratification of a burst 
of temper, and a magnificent stalagmitic column, 
too heavy for one man to lift, lay detached and 
broken, in proof that his body did not share the 
feebleness of his mind. 

Beyond these basins is a low passage through 
which is found the second entrance to the upper 
chamber, but the basins must be crossed in order 
to reach it, and this is not an easy undertaking 
even when their water supply is low, but in the 
early summer they are almost full. 

There are said to be more than one hundred 
caves in Stone County, one of which is supposed 
to be fully as large as Marble Cave, if not larger. 



80 Cave Regions of the 

and is located in the southern part of the county 
but has not been explored. 

Mill Cave is in the northeast of the county, 
and at the entrance is a saw mill which receives 
its working power from the cave stream. In- 
side the cave there is a lake. 

Hermit's Cave is a few miles from Galena, 
and is so named on account of having been 
used as a dwelling by its former owner, who 
kept a coffin in which he intended to place him- 
self before the final summons, but was overtaken 
by death in the forest and it was never used. 
He wrote sermons on the rocks in his cave and 
one of these was afterwards removed. 

Wolf's Den is also near Galena, and has been 
utilized as a sheep fold. 

Wild Man's Cave is near Galena, and on ac- 
count of the stories with which people have been 
frightened, can only be visited by permission 
and with a guard stationed at the entrance. 

Reynard's Cave is four miles west of Galena 
on the farm of Dr. Fox, but is so nearly filled 
up with dripstone that only crawling room 
remains. The doctor's place is a fine locality 
for the collection of fossils. 

At a distance of twelve miles from Galena 
there is said to be a fine natural bridge, well 
worth a visit and sufficiently near Mill Cave for 
both to be seen on the same trip. 

In Bread Tray Mountain there is supposed to 



Ozarks and Black Hills. 81 

be a cave through which a torrent rushes at 
times, that being the only way in which to 
explain the strange thundering, roaring noise 
always heard after a storm, and never at other 
times. 

Besides being a wonderful cave region, and 
rich in the great abundance and variety of native 
fruits and fine timber, Stone County has a vast 
amount of mineral wealth, the heaviest deposits 
being zinc, lead and iron, with some indications 
of silver, gold and copper, which have been 
found but not in paying quantity. Already 
since the summer of 1896 several exceptionally 
pure bodies of zinc have been discovered, the 
white ore of one recently opened deposit giving 
highly gratifying indications as to extent. 
Prospecting may be said to have only commenced 
in this very far from over-crowded region. 



CHAPTER VI. 

OREGOK COUNTY CAVES. 
GREER SPRING. 

Oregon County is also at the extreme southern 
limit of the State of Missouri and was visited, 
not because its caves are supposed to be either 
finer or more numerous than those of all the 
other Ozark counties, but on account of remark- 
able attractions associated vrith them that are 
not known to be equaled, or even subject to 
rivalry, by any similar works of nature in any 
portion of the world. 

The most convenient railway point is Thayer; 
the station hotel affords comfortable accommo- 
dations for headquarters, and the last days of 
September proved a charming time. The foliage 
was in full summer glory, refreshed by a gentle 
and copious rain, and the insinuating tick had 
already retired from active business until the 
following season. 

The carriage having been ordered on condition 
of its being a clear day, we left Thiiyer at eight 
o'clock on a perfect morning to visit Greer 
Spring, and were soon in the depth of the beau- 
tiful Ozark forest, from which we did not once 

?2 




o 
O 



5 



Ozarks and Black Hills. 83 

emerge until Alton, the county seat, was reached, 
the distance traveled being sixteen miles. Here 
we stopped for dinner at the small hotel kept by 
one of the old-time early settlers who came to 
the region before the war. The dinner was a 
surprise, and received the highest commenda- 
tion possible to a dinner, the hearty appreciation 
of a boy. A young nephew, Arthur J. Owen, 
having been invited to act as escort on the trip, 
found all the varied experience in cave hunting 
fully equal to the pictured Joys of anticipation. 
After a large bell suspended somewhere outside 
had notified the business public that dinner was 
ready to be served, we were invited to the din- 
ing-room, where on a long table was the 
abundance of vegetables afforded by the season 
and soil of an almost tropical state, and cooked 
as the white-capped chef of the great hotel, 
where the warm weeks were spent, had not 
learned the secret of ; and the delicately fried 
chicken was not of that curious variety, common- 
ly encountered by travelers, in which the de- 
velopment of legs robs the centiped of his only 
claim to distinction. As the dishes cooled they 
were removed and fresh supplies brought in. 

Our driver received directions about the road 
and we started on another drive of seven miles. 
These directions were " to follow the main road 
to the forks, and then keep to the Van Buren 



84 Cave Regions of the 

road and any one could tell us where Captain 
Greer lives." 

The road was, as before, through the park- 
like forest, and as before, lay chiefly along 
the ridge, so that where clearings had been 
made for farms there were fine views over the 
distant country, which everyvrhere was , forest- 
covered hills, of a rich green near at hand but 
changing with the growth of distance, fir?t to 
dark, and then to lighter blue. 

In these forests were fine young cattle and 
horses, and uncounted numbers of " razor- 
backs," or as they are otherwise called, " wind- 
splitters." For the benefit of those who may 
not be familiar with the names, it might be well 
to explain that they are the natural heirs of the 
native wild hog of Missouri and Arkansas. The 
nephew was greatly amused at seeing many of 
them with wooden yokes on their long necks, to 
prevent an easy entrance into fields and gardens 
by squeezing through the spaces between fence 
rails. These animals are such swift runners it 
is said they can safel}'- cross the railroad between 
trucks of the fast express. Their snouts are so 
long and thin, it is also claimed that two can 
drink from a jug at the same time; never having 
seen it done, however, this is not vouched for, 
but merely repeated as hearsa3^ 

After a time we stopped to inquire the way of 
an old man dipping water from a pond by the 



Ozarks and Black Hills. • 85 

roadside. He told us he was dipping water to 
wash the wheat he was sowing in the field just 
over the fence, and that we reach the forks, then 
to keep the Van Buren road, pass two houses on 
the left, a white one on the right, another on the 
left and then inquire the way — anyone could tell 
us, and Captain Greer would show us to the 
Spring, " for he is a mighty accommodating 
man." 

On we went to the forks where in the point of 
the Y stood a large tree with a Van Buren sign- 
board on one side, and in the direction it pointed, 
we turned, although rather reluctantly, for it 
looked little used and rocky, while the other 
was in good condition ; but we followed the 
sign-board and had no misgivings until it began 
to be realized that a great deal of time was being 
passed but no houses. The morning had been 
very chilly, but now the atmosphere was just at 
that balmy point between warm and cool that 
makes mere living an unqualified luxury ; and 
added to this we soon found ourselves in a deep 
canon no less beautiful than the justly celebrated 
North Cheyenne Canon near Colorado Springs. 

There was now no doubt that we were on the 
wrong road, but such magnificence was unex- 
pected and not to be turned from with indif- 
ference. 

For some distance the road makes a gradual 
and rather perilous looking descent along the 



86 Cave Beg ions of the 

steep and broken slope on the shady side of the 
ancient river's great retaining- wall, while that 
opposite is glorified by the brilliant glow of the 
afternoon sun, which adds an equal charm to the 
rich, luxuriant foliage below and the tall stately 
pines that adorn, without concealing, the grey 
rock they proudly cling to, or that rises in a 
protecting rampart three hundred feet higher 
than the cailon bed, with banners of the long- 
needled pine waving above to proclaim the perfec- 
tion of Nature's undisturbed freedom. 

The road descending crosses the thread of 
water still flowing among the great rounded 
bowlders left by the former torrent, and our view 
is changed to one of dense, but by no means 
melancholy, shadows, with a crown of golden 
sun-light; and presently the course of the canon 
turns to the east, and it is all filled with the 
yellow rays and we notice the bright red haw- 
thorn berries, and masses of hydrangea still 
showing remnants of their late profusion of 
bloom. We Missourians have a great love of 
fine scenery and generally take long journeys 
into other states in order to gratify the taste, 
while quite unconscious of the wonderful beauty 
and grandeur of the Ozarks. 

Where the canon begins to broaden into a 
small sheltered valley as it approaches Eleven 
Points River, we turned and retraced our way 
to the forks, and a short distance beyond to a 



Ozarks and Black Hills. 8=7 

house where we might again inquire. A woman 
came to the open door as we stopped and in 
answer to a question said: "You ought to 
have asked me when you passed here a while 
ago." 

Apologies for the seeming neglect were offered 
and accepted, then she explained that both 
roads went to Van Buren but not to Greer 
Spring, where in due time we at length arrived. 

The house being in one corner of a "forty " 
and the spring in that diagonally opposite, there 
was a walk of nearly that distance before coming 
to an old road inclining steeply down into what 
looked to be a narrow canon. About midway of 
this sloping road, the space confined between 
perpendicular walls, rising to heights above on 
one side and descending to the stream on the 
other, widens suddenly and a picturesque old mill 
comes into view, it having been wholly screened 
from the approach by the rich growth of shrubs 
and trees. Chief in abundance among this lux- 
ury of leaf was the hydrangea, — a favorite shrub 
largely imported into this country from Japan 
before it was discovered as a native. The mill 
site seems to have been selected for its beauty 
although we were told that at this point the stream 
is seventy-two feet wide, and two and one half 
feet deep, but could be raised thirty feet with 
perfect safety by a dam, for which the rock is 
already on the ground and much of it broken 



88 Cave Regions of the 

ready for use. The flow is said to be two hun- 
dred and eighty yards per minute, with no 
appreciable variation, and never freezes. The 
high walls of the Greer Spring gorge will, of 
course, far more than double the value it would 
otherwise possess, when it becomes desirable 
to control and turn to practical account the 
power now going so cheerily to waste, but the 
artistic loss will be proportionately severe. 

The old mill was the scene of great activity 
in former times, but was closed on account 
of an unfortunate accident and for years has 
had no other duty than simply to serve as a 
portion of the landscape. 

Just beyond, the canon makes a curving bend, 
the road dwindles to a narrow path and we 
behold the most beautiful scene imaginable. 

The canon has come to an end and is shut in 
by a graceful curve of the high, perpendicular 
grey walls that are crowned with trees and 
shrubs, and decked below with a thick carpet of 
bright green moss. In this basin, which is 
nearly (me hundred feet across, Greer Spring 
plunges up from beneath through on opening 
nine feet in diameter, in the midst of a pool of 
water six feet deejD, and having an unvarying 
temperature of forty-nine degrees throughout 
the year. This water is so perfectly clear that 
not the least pebble is obscured from view, and 
the color scheme is most marvelous. 



Ozarks and Black Hills. 89 

Where the great spring forces its way to the 
surface, the water is a deep, brilliant blue with 
white caps, and its falling weight keeps clear 
of moss a large spot of fine, pure, white sand- 
stone, while all the balance appears a vivid green 
from the moss that thrives beneath the moving 
water; and surrounding these are the handsome, 
foliage-decked grey walls. The edges of the 
basin are thickly strewn with fallen rocks 
deeply covered with moss, in which small ferns 
are growing, and on these gay stepping stones 
we crossed to the head-wall of the canon to find 
ourselves at the open mouth of a cave from 
which flows a clear, shallow stream to join 
the waters of the Spring in that wonderful 
basin. The entrance to the cave is an arch 
about fifteen feet wide and twelve feet 
high, with the clear, shallow stream spreading 
over the clean rock floor from side to side. 
Here now was presented a difficulty. Truly the 
cave was not quite dry. The water was about 
ten inches deep, and my boots in Thayer. Con- 
trary to advice, however, my nephew had 
brought his, and with a boy's kindness loaned 
them while he made the trip with bare feet and 
rolled up trousers. 

A short distance within, the cave widens and 
the floor of the extension being somewhat 
higher, is dry, but the roof drops so low over 
it that the water-course is an easier route of 



90 Cace Regions of the 

travel ; and this soon widens into a lake above 
Vv'liich the cei'ing rises in a broad dome less 
than twenty feet in height, and hung with 
heavy masses of dripstone draperies of va- 
rying length, from five to seven feet; and all 
the ceilings are fringed at various heights with 
stalactites of every size and age, some being 
a clear, colorless onyx, while others proclaim 
their great age in the fact that they have so 
deteriorated that the onyx texture is either part- 
ly or completely lost, and what was once a pure 
drip crystal has returned to a common, porous, 
dull-colored limestone so soft that portions can 
be rubbed to powder in the hand. 

Picking the way carefully as the depth of the 
lovely lake increased, we followed the sound of 
falling water and peered into the dark dis- 
tance in a vain elfort to see it, yet expecting to 
reach that special object of interest by keeping 
to the shallower parts of the lake. These ex- 
pectations were shattered suddenly when the 
boots filled with water, and that called to mind 
the fact that twenty-three miles and a chilly 
night lay between us and dry clothing ; so we 
returned to the outside world and rested on 
the rocks where Captain Greer and our young 
driver waited for us. The cave has never been 
fully explored, and probably we penetrated far- 
ther than others have ever done, as the owner 



Ozarks and Black Hills. 91 

knew nothing of the falling water we so dis- 
tinctly heard and were surely very near. 

The view from the rocks is wonderfully 
beautiful and includes both the entrance to the 
cave, with its flovnng stream, and the receiving 
basin with its bounding stream. But it was 
growing late in the afternoon, and there was 
another cave whose entrance was in the perpen- 
dicular wall above the end of the path by which 
we had come. This entrance could be reached 
by a dilapidated ladder; assisted by a forked 
pole and supplied with candles and matches, 
my nephew and I achieved the ascent with not 
much trouble. Here Ave found what is, no 
doubt, one of the oldest caves known. 

The original cavity is nearly filled up with masses 
of onyx — colorless crystal and white striped with 
pale shades of grey. The cave is perfectly dry and 
freshly broken surfaces in some places show 
signs of deterioration, so how can we venture 
even a guess as to the time it has required to 
first excavate the cave and then fill it with 
masses of rock deposited by the slow drip pro- 
cess, and later, for that crystalline rock in a 
now dry atmosphere to present a perceptible 
weakening? We went as far as passages could 
be crawled into, which was no great distance, 
and at once started on our uncertain descent of 
the ladder ; but this was not a matter of so 
much concern as the upward trip, for the success 



92 Cave Regions of the 

of which some doubts were entertained; for 
going down is always naturally a less certain 
matter, as one can fall if more desirable means 
are unsuccessful, and I have unexpectedly 
reached many coveted points in this simple 
manner. 

Taking a last look at Greer Spring a\ itii its 
cave river, grey walls, gay with foliage, and all 
the harmony of color and form combined in the 
narrow canon that was once the main body of a 
great cave, I recalled views on the Hudson 
River and in the mountains of Maryland, Vir- 
ginia and Pennsylvania, and others out in the 
Rocky Mountains in Colorado and the "Wau- 
satch in Utah, but amid all their wonderful 
grandeur and famous beauty, could remember 
no spot superior to this masterpiece of the 
Ozarks. 

The proprietor of the Spring and a thous- 
and acres of land adjacent, took personal 
possession on the day of Lincoln's first election, 
to establish a home. 

The sun having failed to consider our wishes 
was now about to disappear in a gleaming tlooil 
of gold, so the return to Thayer that night Avas 
out of the question. Our host and his wife ob- 
served that fact and cordially invited us to re- 
main for the night and as much longer as we 
would like to, but being unwilling to impose on 
kindness to suc-h an extent, we returned to the 



Ozarks and Black Hills. 93 

hotel in Alton, and now urgently advise that 
those who ever have an opportunity to enjoy a 
moonlight drive through the Ozark forests 
should not let it pass unimproved. 

OTHER OAVES NEAR BY. 

About twelve miles from Alton there are 
three other caves worthy of attention. Two of 
these are known only as The Saltpetre Caves, 
and the third as The Bat Cave. 

Not many persons care to visit the Bat Cave, 
for although its inhabitants are small, they 
have evidently decided to profit by the experi- 
ence of the Red Man and take no risks through 
hospitality. Their warnings can be heard like 
distant thunder for some distance outside the 
cave, and any unheeding intruder is set upon in 
fury by such vast numbers of the little creat- 
ures that his only safety is in hasty retreat. 

During the war the two Saltpetre Caves were 
worked to a considerable extent, and also served 
as safe retreats for the residents of the region, 
as well as the visiting "Jonny, " when the vi- 
cinity became oppressively "blue." 

Both of these caves are especially notable on 
account of the fine stalactites with which they 
are abundantly supplied; most of them being- 
snow white and from fourteen to twenty feet in 
length. 

Unfortunately, most of the caves in this region 
have been deprived of great quantities of their 



91: Cave Eegions of the 

beautiful adornments by visitors who are allowed 
to choose the best and remove it in such quanti- 
ties as may suit their convenience and pleasure. 
Those who own the caves, and those who visit 
them, would do well to remember that if all the 
natural adornment should be allowed to remain 
in its original position, it would continue to 
afford pleasure to many persons for an indefinite 
time; but if broken, removed, and scattered the 
pleasure to a few will be comparatively little 
and that short-lived. The gift of beauty should 
always be honored and protected for the public 
good. 

We were not so fortunate as to discover fossils 
of any kind in this locality, although the search 
was by no means thorough ; but even if it had 
been the result might have ber n the same, since 
that county and others adjoining have been 
mapped as Cambrian. The greater part of the 
exposed rock is a fine sandstone almost as white 
as gypsum on a fresh fracture, and much of it 
is ripple-marked so as to show a beautifully 
fluted surface of rem.arkable regularity. These 
ripple flutings are sometimes more than an incli 
in width, and often less, but the variations never 
appear on the same level, the smallest being seen 
on the liill-tops and the larger outcropping on 
tlie downward slopes. 



CHAPTER VII. 

THE GRAND GULF. 

Oregon County, Missouri, is also fortunate in 
having within its limits the Grand Gulf, which 
has heen declared by competent judges to be 
one of the wonders of the world ; and it offers a 
combination of attractions that certainly entitles 
it to an important place among a limited few of 
America's choicest scenes. 

The Gulf is nearly nine miles northwest of 
Thayer, Missouri, and about equally distant from 
Mammoth Spring in Arkansas, Just a little south 
of the Missouri state line. The drive is a 
pleasant one, as the road winds among the 
forest-clad hills and passes occasional fields of 
cotton and corn ; but having been macadamized 
in very ancient times by the original and all- 
powerful general government of that early period 
is somewhat rough, yet threatens no danger 
greater than the destruction of wheels. 

The only approach to the Gulf is over the hill- 
tops ; and the entrance in past times, while it was 
still a cave, must have been a sink-hole in the 
roof of the largest chamber. This chamber is 
now the upper end of the Grand Gulf, and into 



96 Cave Regions of the 

it we descended by a rugged path, sufficiently 
difficult to maintain expectations of grandeur 
that are not doomed to disappointment. The 
precipitous walls, two hundred feet in height, 
bear a faithful record of the energy of circling 
floods ; but instead of frowning, as some good 
people persistently accuse all noble heights of 
doing, they seem to look with conscious pride 
towards the windings of the great rough chasm, 
where every available spot has been seized on 
as a homestead for some form of vegetation. All 
the great, dark rock masses that interfere with 
easy progress along the lowest depth, were sur- 
rounded by a feathery setting of blooming white 
agaratum ; and each turn in the winding course 
reveals new charms of rock and verdure with 
their varying lights and shadows until the 
crowning glory is reached at the Natural Bridge, 
about twelve hundred feet from the upper end 
of the canon. This bridge is magnificent. It 
was imp'^ssible to secure photographs because 
the abrupt curve by which it is approached 
gave no point of view for a small camera; and it 
was equally impossible to reach desirable points 
for taking measurements, but the open arch is 
not less than twenty feet wide and considerably 
more than that in height. From the floor or 
bed of the Grulf to the road that crosses the 
bridge is more than two hundred feet. The 
passage under the bridge makes a curve, the 



Ozarks and Black Hills. 97 

shortest side of which measures exactly two 
hundred and nineteen feet, and as the width 
varies from twenty to forty feet, the other side 
is longer. Most of the floor is flat and level as 
also is the ceiling, the greatest irregularities 
being along the wall of greater length which 
shows at what points the rushing water has spent 
its force. No water flows through here now 
except in times of heavy rainfall. The other end 
of the bridge has a somewhat smaller span but is 
very handsome, and the outward views from 
both are exceedingly fine. After traversing 
about four hundred feet more of the beautiful, 
high-walled Gulf, we stood before the grand 
entrance to the cave, which is strikingly similar 
to the first arch of the bridge. The only picture 
I was able to get was taken from the slope of the 
Bridge-crown, one hundred feet below the road, 
and merely gives a suggestion of the magnificence 
waiting peacefully for the crowds of eager and 
enthusiastic sight-seers who will in the near 
future rush to this charming region in the ' 'Land 
of the Big Red Apple." 

My companions were the same as mentioned 
in the preceding chapter, a nephew, James 
Arther Owen, and an obliging, tall young man 
of twenty, who acted as guide and driver. 

Relieving ourselves of all superfluous burdens 
just within the cave entrance, we lighted candles 
and sat down to wait for our eyes to adjust 



98 Cave Regions of the 

themselves to the changed condition, from bril- 
liant sunlight to absolute darkness, broken only 
by the feeble strength of three candles. It was 
noticeable that in the moist atmosphere of the 
Missouri eaves, three candles were not more 
than equal to one in the dry caves of South 
Dakota. 

Very soon we were able to continue the inspec- 
tion of our surroundings, and the large passage 
we were in would more properly be called a 
long chamber, of irregular width but averaging 
about thirty feet. This ends abruptly nearly 
five hundred feet from the entrance, but a small 
passage scarcely more than six feet high runs 
off at right angles, and into this we turn. It is 
not quite so nearly dry as the outer chamber, and 
at a distance of less than one hundred feet we 
suddenly come to the end of dry land at an 
elbow of the silently flowing river whose channel 
we had almost stepped into. The ceiling dipped 
so "we were not able to stand straight, and the 
guide said he had never gone farther ; but to his 
surprise here was a light boat which I am ready 
to admit he displayed no eagerness to appropri- 
ate to his own use, and swimming about it, close 
to shore, were numerous small, eyeless fish, pure 
white and perfectly fearless; the first I had ever 
se€fn, and little beauties. 

By burning magnesium ribbon we saw that 
tbe -passage before us was a low arch and occu- 



Ozarks and Black Hills. 99 

pied from wall to wall by water, the direction of 
the flow being into another of somewhat greater 
size at right angles to that by which we had 
come, and at the mouth of this lay the boat. 
The distance we could see in either direction 
was of tantalizing shortness, and the boat was 
provided with no means of guidance or control, 
save an abundance of slender twine which 
secured it to a log of drift from the outside ; so 
I decided to leave my companions in charge of 
the main coil of twine while I went on an excur- 
sion alone, there being not much evident cause 
for apprehension as no living cow could ever 
have made the trip to this favored spot. 

Although the water looked perfectly placid, 
the boat drifted with surprising speed, so that 
the two scared faces peering after me were soon 
lost sight of. The channel was nowhere more 
than six feet wide, consequently as the boat 
inclined to drive against either wall I was able 
with care to keep it off the rocks with my 
hands, and in the same way guide it around the 
sharp turns in safety. After several of these 
turns there appeared the mouth of a passage so 
much smaller that the roof was only tv/elve 
inches above the sides of tha boat and I 
could touch both walls at the same time. By 
running the boat across this it was held in place 
by the current, and I could sit at ease and enjoy 
the position, which even the least imaginative 



100 Cave Regions of the 

person can readily conceive to have been a 
novel one. 

The small eyeless fish had been noticeable in 
the water everywhere but now came swimming 
about the boat in an astonishing multitude, and 
as unconscious of any possible danger as bees in 
a flower garden. Having no eyes, they were 
naturally undisturbed by the light, so the candle 
could be held close to the water for a satisfac- 
tory examination of the happy creatures. 

They bore a striking resemblance to minnows, 
although a few were larger, and it is claimed 
that four or five inches are sizes not unusual, 
but they happened not to be on exhibition. 
Even dipping a hand into the water in their 
midst occasioned no alarm, and they might 
have been caught by dozens. 

The guide now loudly called that he had fears 
of the twine being cut on the sharp edges of 
rock, and that cutting off all possibility of the 
boats return, which being sufficiently reason- 
able, explorations were indefinitely suspended, 
and a landing soon made. The camera and 
flash-light were then prepared for taking a view, 
and a point of light being needed to work by the 
nephew was asked to sit in the boat with his 
candle, to which he readily consented; but judg- 
ing from the developed picture it may be 
doubted if his pleasure at the time was extreme- 
ly keen. 



Ozarks and Black Hills. 101 

On leaving the cave the guide said it would 
not be necessary to return to the upper end of 
the Gulf in order to reach the surface, as the 
ascent could be made in another place; and 
leading the way to the left of the entrance he 
started up the nearly perpendicular wall, more 
than two hundred feet high, by a sort of " blind 
trail" that would have caused a mountain 
sheep to sigh for wings, but it was very beau- 
tiful. 

We walked over to the wagon road on the 
high ridge above the middle of the bridge and 
going down the forest-clad slopes to the perpen- 
dicular wall in which is the smaller of the great 
arches, admired from this fair point of view 
the marvelous grandeur of one of the greatest 
natural wonders. 

The weather being perfect alter a rain the 
day before, there was no need of haste to get in- 
doors, so we lingered into the afternoon and 
then drove to the Mammoth Spring, in Arkansas, 
a short distance south of the Missouri state line, 
where the Cave River, just visited, comes to the 
surface in a bounding spring of great force. 
The distance being little less than nine miles. 

The basin filled by the Spring might be called 
a lake, as its size of two hundred by three hun- 
dred feet gives it that appearance, and the co!or 
is a remarkable deep blue. The volume of 
water is so nearly uniform that the height 



102 Cave Regions. 

seldom varies more than two or three inches, 
but three years ago a storm of unusual violence 
carried out most of the native fish, and in 
restocking from Government supplies, the clear, 
cold water suggested an experiment with 
mountain trout which are found to be doir.g well. 

Yfhere INIammoth Spring flows out its power 
is utilized by a flour mill on one bank and a cotton 
mill on the other, and the water flowing on 
forms Spring River, well known for the charm 
of its beautiful scenery. 

This Spring is described by Dr. David Dale 
Owen in his First Report of a Geological Recon- 
noissance of the northern counties of Arkansas, 
1857 and 1858, pp. GO-61. 



CHAPTER VIII. 

THE BLACK HILLS AND BAB LANDS. 

In order to thoroughly appreciate and enjoy 
the wonderful caves of South Dakota, which are 
found within the limits of the Black Hills, it is 
necessary to have some knowledge of the geol- 
ogical character and history of that peculiar 
region. 

Prof. J. E. Todd, State Geologist, in his 
' ' Preliminary Report on the Geology of South 
Dakota," gives an interesting "Historical Sketch 
of Explorations" in his state, beginning with 
the expedition of Captains Lewis and Clark to 
the upper Missouri regions in 1804 -6 to explore 
that portion of the recent Louisiana Purchase 
for the government and notify the Indians of 
the transfer ; and including all other important 
expeditions since that time down to his own 
official tour of the Black Hills and Bad Lands 
in 1894. His own descriptions are so concise 
and graphic as to inyite quotation. Of the 
Hills he says: 

"The Black Hills have an area of five-thous- 
and square miles of a rudely elliptical form with 
its major axis, approximately, north-northwest. 

103 



104 Cave Eegions of the 

Most of this area lies within our state. The 
true limit of the Hills is quite distinctly marked 
by a sharp ridge of sandstone, three hundred to 
six hundred feet in relative height, Avliich be- 
comes broader and more plateau-like towards 
the north and south ends. This ridge is sepa- 
rated from the higher mass of hills within 
by a valley one to three miles in breadth, which 
is known as the Red Valley, from its brick-red 
soil, or the 'race course,' which name was giv- 
en it by the Indians because of its open and 
smooth character, affording easy and rapid pas- 
sage around the Hills. The Junction of the 
outer base of the Hills with the surrounding 
table lands has an altitude of three thousand, 
five hundred to four thousand feet. Within this 
Red Valley one gradually ascends the outer 
slope of the Hills and soon enters, at an altitude 
of four thousand five hundred or five thousand 
feet, the woody portion of the region. This outer 
slope varies greatly in width and is underlaid 
by older sedimentary rocks, cut in almost every 
direction by narrow deep canons. This feature 
covers nearly the whole of the western half of 
the Hills proper, where erosion has been less 
active on account of its distance from the main 
channels of drainage. Usuall}', from the broken 
interior edge of this slope or sedimentary pla- 
teau one descends a blufi^ or escarpment, and 
enters the central area of slates, granite, 



Ozarks and J^lack Ilills. 105 

and quartzites, which is carved into high 
ridges and sharp peaks cut by ynanj narrow and 
deep valleys and ravines and generally thickly 
timbered with the common pine of the Rocky 
Mountains. Tovrard the south, about Harney 
Peak, the surface is peculiarly rugged and diffi- 
cult to traverse. Toward the north, also, about 
Terry and Custer peaks, a smaller rugged sur 
face appears ; but in the central area between 
and extending west of the Harney range is a 
region which is characterized by open and level 
parks much lower than the surrounding peaks 
and ridges." 

The Archaean rocks which form the core of 
the Hills mark the center of the various uplifts 
which have attended their formation and con- 
trolled their history. The coarse granite of 
Harney Peak indicating that, as the central 
point of the earli' st upheaval, and the three 
p)rphyries known as rhyolite, trachyte, and 
phonolite, showing the uplifts of later periods 
to have had their centers a little more to the 
north, but the entire area is said to be only 
about sixty miles long and twenty five miles in 
width. It is exceptionally rough and moun- 
tainous, and consequently has great charms for 
the lover of fine scenery. Erosion has only par- 
tially denuded the j)eaks of the sedimentary rocks 
through which they were thrust up, or by which 
they were overlaid during the earlier part of 



106 Cave Regions of the 

several subsequent periods of submersion. The 
Hills, in those remote times, led but a doubtful 
and precarious existence, being now an isolated 
island rising out of a shallow sea, and then, 
owing to a general subsidence, submerged in 
tlie ocean to so great a depth that even Harney 
Peak is supposed to have almost, if not entirely, 
disappeared. This up and down motion con- 
tinued at intervals until the Fox Hills epoch of 
tile Cretaceous Age, at the close of which the 
sea retired forever from that portion of the 
country. In the next epoch fresh water work be- 
gan ar.d extensive marshes were formed, with an 
abundant growth of vegetation and reptiles. 
There vras also "much volcanic violence which 
resulted in the fine scenery in the north end of 
the Black Hills, and probably opened the fissures 
to form Wind Cave, the Onyx Caves in the 
southern hills and Crystal Cave near the eastern 
edge toward the north. This was near the close 
of tlie Cretaceous Age. But here is a point on 
which the best authorities who have studied the 
porph^-ry peaks, have failed to agree; Prof. N. 
II. "Winchell believing that the intrusion occur- 
red, probably, during the Jura Trias, but as 
Cretaceous beds, of more recent date, are found 
to have been distorted by the outflow, it seems 
that Professors Todd, Newton and Carpenter 
hold the stronger position and that the later 
time is correct. 



Ozarhs and Black Hills. 107 

No record of the next geological stage, which 
was the Eocene, or earlier part of the Tertiary- 
Age, has been found in the Hills, because they 
were at that time dry land with gently flowing, 
shallow streams, and consequently no strata 
were laid down; but they are supposed, through 
later evidences, to have had a tropical climate 
and vegetation, enjoyed by large animals of 
strange new forms. The volume of fresh water 
afterwards became so great that immense lakes 
spread over large portions of the west, one of 
which occupied most of the region around the 
Black Hills at the beginning of the Miocene, 
and animal life was more abundant than ever 
before and of higher orders, many species being 
the same as are now in existence. The weather 
became more and more inclement and as the 
storms increased the erosion of the Hills also 
increased, and the rivers changed to torrents 
with deep channels. Earthquakes are supposed 
to have occurred and also volcanic eruptions. 

The Black Hills were now rising steadily, and 
as the slope of the streams increased, the chan- 
nels cut deeper, and the fissures now known as 
caves had long been filled with water. 

The most important of the numerous animals 
of the Tertiary Age yet discovered in the Hills 
and surrounding region, are the Titanotherium 
or Brontotherium, similar to our Hippopotamus, 
the Oreodon, and a small horse having three 



108 Cave Regions of the 

toes on each foot. A little later in the same Age 
the horses were similar to those of the present 
time and of equal size, which proves that the 
wild horses of the West were not descended from 
the few lost by the Spanish Invaders. At this 
time the first lions, camels, mastodons, and 
mammoths also appeared. The remains of these 
animals are so abundant in places as to indicate 
that they perished in herds that were over- 
whelmed suddenly by great floods, and many, 
no doubt, huddled together and perished with 
cold; for with the beginning of the present age 
the Hills had reached their highest elevation, 
the inclement weather increased, and the trop- 
ical climate suddenly changed to one extremely 
cold. It was the beginning of the Glacial 
Period or Ice Age, when a large portion of the 
United States is supposed to have been covered 
by a sheet of ice. The ice is believed to have 
entered South Dakota from the northeast and its 
drift across the state limited by a line so closely 
following the present course of the Missouri 
River that many of us would be inclined to con- 
sider it the western blutT. Beyond this line the 
ice failed to push its way, but the Hills were 
subject to heavy rain storms that filled the 
streams and carried large quantities of bowlders 
and other eroded material, both coarse and fine, 
down into the valleys and over the lower hills, 
where much of the moderately coarse can now 



Ozarks and Black Hills. 109 

be seen exposed on the surface, and fine speci- 
mens collected without the use of a hammer. 
The brilliantly colored, striped and mottled 
agates, and the bright, delicate tints of the 
quartz crystal, are particularly attractive to the 
majority of visitors. The beauty of these gaily 
colored rocks is quite extensively utilized by the 
inhabitants of the southern and southeastern 
hills to supply the place of growing plants which 
are generally denied by the inconvenience of the 
water supply. The quartziteof the Hills is well 
crystallized and heavy. I have one beautiful 
specimen of the dark Indian red variety through 
which passes a narrow line of pale blue, and the 
yellow quartzite or jasper sometimes shows 
dendrite markings. Very great quantities of 
agates and jasper, mostly in small pieces, but 
unlimited variety, are to be seen in portions of 
the Bad Lands, south of the fork of the Cheyenne 
River, with an almost equal abundance of 
baculites and numerous other fossils. 

The wide expanse of deep ravines and sharp, 
barren ridges in the Bad Lands is a unique 
departure from the usual phases of natural 
scenery that inspire interest and wonder, but no 
great admiration, until one soon learns that the 
law of compensation has been strictly observed. 
The beauty of vegetation denied those desolate 
buttes and ridges is atoned for by a marvelous 
abundance of most wonderful crystals of aragon- 



110 Cave Regions of the 

ite, calcite, barite and satin spar ; each to itself, 
or two or more combined in beautiful geodes or 
else arranged in great flat slabs crystallized on 
both sides of a thin sheet of lime. These slabs 
are composed of crystals of uniform size and of 
a pale green tint. But the geodes show some 
striking combinations of both crystals and colors 
with an exterior formed like box work, com- 
posed of a very heavy dark material said to 
be a mixture of barium, calcium and iron. The 
interior maybe a bright green or lemon yellow, or 
perhaps the two in combination, v.'hile others 
yet may be either of these varieties with the 
addition of flat crystals of almost transparent 
satin spar. These crystals also occur in masses 
of the same box-like formation rising just 
so much above the surface of the barren ridge 
they occupy as to give it the appearance of a 
prairie dog town. One hill-top over which an 
abundance of detached crystals, of the palest 
water-green tint, has been spread, gave the im- 
pression of being covered with crushed ice. 
This transformation from a richly tropical to u 
marvelously barren region, was accomplished 
during the time when storms reigned over the 
Hills and ice ruled the country to the north and 
east. 

The long slender barite crystals of a bright 
golden brown color are especially beautiful but 
are generally seen in the specimen stores, as the 



Ozarks and Black Hills. Ill 

deposit is confined to limited areas and the few 
persons familiar with the locations are not over 
anxious to introduce the general public. 

The fossil remains previously referred to are 
of course only a few of the most important, but 
it is remarked as a curious and notable fact that 
among the fossils of the lower orders of life in 
the Bad Lands, the heads have not been pre- 
served. On account of scarcity of water it is 
necessary for parties to carry a supply even 
when they expect to be in the vicinity of the 
Cheyenne River ind probably ford the South 
fork, as these waters carry in solution a quan- 
tity of alkali that renders them unfit for drink- 
ing, although the effects would not be fatal but 
simply the extreme reverse of pleasant. 

No caves have been discovered in the Bad 
Lands, unless that name be applied to some of 
the geodes which are really grottoes, they being 
of sufficient size for a man to stand in. The 
Black Hills, however, contain some of the most 
remarkable caves ever yet discovered, of which 
those of greates timportanccjare Wind Cave and 
the three Onyx Caves near Hot Springs, in the 
southeastern part of the Hills, and Crystal Cave 
near Piedmont, in the northeast. All of these 
occur in the Carboniferous Limestone which 
foi'ms an outer belt around the central mass or 
core of the Hills and no doubt, as previously 



112 Cave Regions. 

suggested, owes its fissures to earthquakes which 
preceded or accompanied the porphyry intrusions 
by which in some localities its strata have 
been thrown into a vertical position. 



CHAPTER IX. 

WIND CAVE. 

Wind Cave was discovered in 1881 by a hunt- 
er named Thomas Bingham, who being weary 
of a fruitless chase sat down to rest, and was 
soon startled by the sound of rushing wind on a 
calm day ; and at the same time by a singular 
hair-raising sensation, as his hat was lifted from 
his head and thrown high in the air. He is 
said to have afterwards declared that although 
frightened nearly out of his wits, he determined to 
find the cause of his alarm, and on turning 
slightly discovered a hole about eight by twelve 
inches in size through which a roaring wind 
was issuing from the earth. As his hair main- 
tained the aggressive attitude taken, the recov- 
ered hat could not be returned to its usual place, 
so an hour was spent in laying it across the 
opening and watching its instant projection into 
upper space; after which he set out to tell of 
the wonderful discovery. The announcement, 
hovvever, was not received seriously and he was 
assured of the impossibility of the wind blowing 
through a hill of solid rock, and his brother ex- 
plained to him that he had been too self-indul- 

»8 



114 Cave Regions of the 

gent and consequently imagined the whole affair. 
A protest of total abstinence failed to inspire 
confidence, but the brother promised to go the 
next day to see for himself, and did. The hat 
was again placed over the opening as before, but 
instead of taking the expected lofty flight, it 
was drawn in and has never since been seen : 
the current had reversed. Soon after this the 
hole was enlarged to eighteen by thirty inches 
and the cave entered by quite a number of ven- 
turesome persons assisted by a long rope and 
ample personal courage. No other improve- 
ments were made, and only a short distance 
was explored, until Mr. J. D. McDonald settled 
on the property in 1890 ; since which time he 
and his sons have explored ninety-seven miles of 
passage and done such extensive work in open- 
ing up small passages and placing ladders, that 
it is now possible for visitors to travel long dis- 
tances with surprising ease and comfort. The 
measure of distances in the cave is not by the 
usual guess-work method which has established 
the short-measure reputation for cave miles, but 
is done with a fair degree of accuracy by means 
of the twine used to mark the trail in exploring 
new passages. A careful measurement of the 
twine has shown it to run nine balls to the 
mile with a close average of regularity, so it is the 
custom to add another mile to the cave record an 
often as a ninth ball becomes exhausted. 



Ozarks and Black Hills. 115 

Wind Cave is twelve miles north of Hot 
Springs by a good road which offers somewhat 
meager attractions to the artist, but is more 
liberal towards the geologist, and especially so 
in fine exposures of the gypsum bearing Red 
Beds of the Triassic. Limited patches of it are 
also exposed in each of the caves, generally car- 
rying small quantities of selenite, which is 
crystallized gypsum, or in other words, crystal- 
lized sulphate of lime. This brilliant red color 
is so prominent in portions of the Hills, and 
attracts so much wondering attention in other 
well known regions of the West, that it would 
seem an unpardonable neglect of opportunity 
should we fail to again quote Prof. Todd for an 
explanation of the cause of the vivid coloring. 
Commencing he says : ' 'Newton remarks con- 
cerning this: * 'A large percentage of peroxide 
of iron in the red beds, to which they owe their 
bright red color, bears an interesting relation to 
the absence of fossils. The material of which 
sediments are formed is derived, by the various 
procCvSses of denudation, from the rocks of 
older land surfaces. Whatever iron they con- 
tain is dissolved from the land and transported 
in a condition of protoxide and some proto 
salt, such as the carbonate, and the process 
is facilitated by the presence of carbonic acid 

* U. S. Geological Surrey. Geology of the Black Hills. Henry 
Jfewton, p. 138. 



116 Cave Regions of the 

in the water. Now iron occurs in these 
older rocks as protoxide and peroxide, the 
former of wliicli is soluble and the latter 
insoluble in water. The peroxide, how- 
ever, bj the action of organic matter, such as 
is held in solution in boggy waters, may be 
deprived of a portion of its oxygen and conver- 
ted into jDrotoxide and thus be rt ndered solu- 
ble. If the iron-bearing water is confined first 
in a shallow basin and exposed long to the ac- 
tion of the atmosphere the protoxide of iron 
absorbs the oxygen and is precipitated as 
an insoluble red peroxide of iron. If, 
however, plant or animal life be present in 
sufficient quantities, this oxidation is prevented. 
In case but little foreign material, clay or sand, 
has been brought by the waters, the deposit 
will be an iron ore. In case large quantities of 
foreign material are deposited from the waters 
at the same time, there will be produced, in the 
absence of life, a brown or red clay or sandstone, 
and in its presence a white or light colored for- 
mation containing the iron as a carbonate. We 
reason therefore from the condition in which 
the iron is found in the red beds, that there 
could have been little or no life, animal or veg- 
etable, in the water from which it was deposi- 
ted. The conclusion is strengthened by the 
fact of the large quantities of gypsum which 
are usually derived from the evaporation of saline 



Ozarks and Black Hills. 117 

waters. The degree of saline concentration which 
the precipitation of gypsum indicates, would 
be highly inimical to life. The presence of 
gypsum helps to account for the absence of life, 
and the absence of life accounts for the brilliant 
color. The three prominent characteristics of 
the formation (that is the red beds) are there- 
fore quite in harmony with each other.' " (Geol. 
Blk. Hills, p. 138.) 

Continuing the subject. Professor Todd says: 
"Accepting this explanation of the striking 
red color, the question remains as to how these 
circumstances, favorable for its formation, 
were produced. 

" This red color is quite common in the 
whole Rocky Mountain region, not only on the 
eastern slope of the mountains, but to the vari- 
ous detached members of the system. We must, 
therefore, look for some extensive condition. 
If we seek some case in the present, parallel to 
the one already indicated, we perhaps can find 
none better than one on the eastern shore of the 
Caspian Sea, where, because of dry climate and 
the shallow waters, the deposition of gypsum 
and salt is now going on. In the gulf knowa 
as the Kara Boghaz, which is separated from the 
Caspian by a narrow strait, the evaporation is 
so rapid as to produce an almost constant 
flow from the sea into it. This strait and this 
gulf give the impression to an unlearned ob- 



118 Cave Regions of the 

server that there must be a mysterious subter- 
ranean outlet. The water flows in, carrj'ing 
with it the salt and other soluble minerals. 
It then evaporates, leaving the salt and minerals 
behind. " 

This explanation is calculated to aflFord par- 
ticular pleasure to the many visitors to the 
Garden of the Gods, in Colorado, who seldom 
receive satisfactory answers to their questions 
as to the reasons " why." In that much visi- 
ted spot, however, the great mass of the deposit 
has been removed by erosion and the curiously 
shaped remnants are only such portions as were 
exceptionally hard and consequentl}'^ withstood 
the action of the submerging waters. 

Having made a considerable stop on the way to 
Wind Cave, we will now hurry on, but with good 
horses and a fine day the drive is one of great 
pleasure. The road gradually rises to higher 
ground and soon reaches a point six hun- 
dred feet more elevated than Hot Springs, with a 
charming view of hill and valley distances, and 
the way then continues over the hill-tops. At one 
point by the roadside a circle of tent-stones still 
marks the spot occupied by Sitting Bull for a 
week or more after the Custer massacre, Avhile 
he camped here and in the security of his 
commanding position watched the movements 
of the government troops who were in search 
of him. 



Ozarks and Black Hills. 119 

Hot Springs and Buffalo Gap are both included 
in the wide-spread view. Beside the road and 
scattered about in all directions are fine speci 
mens of agates and quartz crystal which seem 
most beautiful and most abundant on the hills 
in the immediate vicinity of the cave, the crys- 
tals being either rose pink, pale green, yellow, 
white or colorless. 

Arriving at the cave, the entrance is not vis- 
ible, but between the ravine in which it is 
located and the road, there is the cave office 
and small hotel, on the ravine side of which an 
outer stairway leads down to the cave entrance, 
over which has been built a log cabin. 

On account of the precautions taken for the 
protection of visitors, accidents are so rare that 
it might almost be said that none occur. Every 
person is required to register before entering 
the cave and all returning- parties are carefully 
counted, although they are usually unaware of 
the fact. They are always accompanied by two 
guides and others are added if the party is 
large. No one is, on any account, permitted to 
wander in advance of the head guide or linger 
behind the one in the rear. 

Within the cabin the immediate entrance to 
the cave is securely closed, and in order that 
the door may not be forced from its fastenings 
by the roaring wind which shakes it threaten- 
ingly, it opens in, instead of out. This wind 



120 Cave Begions of the 

suggested the name Wind Cave, and will proba- 
bly be utilized, at no very distant time, to gen- 
erate electricity for lighting the cavern. 

The wind is strongest at the surface, and a 
guide goes down first to place lights in 
sheltered nooks where the force has begun to 
diminish, about fifty feet below the entrance ; 
and here we light our candles which, if guarded 
somewhat, are not extinguished unless the cur- 
rent is unusually severe. The balance of the 
descent of one hundred and fifty-five feet from 
the surface to the first chamber is easily accom- 
plished. 

This would be the least interesting room in 
the cave if it were not the Bride's C!hamber, on 
account of having once been the scene of a mar- 
riage ceremony. But no others are in need of 
assistance of such romantic nature, as all are 
curiously and handsomely decorated, with such 
a charming variety of deposits, artistically 
massed, combined or contrasted, that every step 
brings fresh pleasure, and monotony is nowhere. 

Passing from this room by a long, narrow 
passage, in the walls of which are observed 
many beautiful little pockets of crystals, 
attention is presently called to Lincoln's Fire- 
place, a perfectly natural specimen of the old- 
fashioned design broadly open in the chimney ; 
doubtless just such an one as Mr. Lincoln's good 
mother hung the crane in and set the Dutch oven 



Ozarks and Black Hills. 121 

before. A little beyond and on the opposite 
side of the crevice is Prairie-dog town, not a 
very extensive town, to be sure, but so true a 
copy that one unfamiliar with the small animal 
and his style of architecture would afterwards 
easily recognize both. At one time his dogship 
was carried away by a too eager collector, but a 
letter to the suspected visitor brought him home 
by the next freight. 

The Dutch Clock occupies a position on a 
shelf near by, and all southern visitors greet the 
Alligator as a familiar friend, as all of us joy- 
fully meet any acquaintance from home. 

A long narrow passage, formerly a "tight 
crawl," but later opened up by heavy blasting, 
must be traversed before we come to the Snow 
Ball Room, beautiful with round spots of 
untinted carbonate of lime, as if fresh soft snow 
had been thrown by the handful over walls and 
ceilings, with the additional ornamentation of 
calcite crystals. In the crevice beyond rises the 
Church Steeple, diminishing regularly, though 
roughly, in size, to a height of sixty feet, but 
not degraded with the little squirming stairway 
usually seen in Church spires. 

The next room is the Post Office, in which we 
are for the first time introduced to the greatest 
peculiarity and most abundant formation known 
to the cave. Being a newly discovered addition 
to geology it has no scientific name and there- 



122 Cave Regions of the 

fore is simply called box work, because it 
resembles boxes of many shapes and sizes. The 
formation of the box work is generally regarded 
as an unexplained and unexplainable mj'^stery, 
but a careful stud}^ of various portions of the 
cave shows it in all stages of development and 
suggests a reasonable theorj'^ as to the cause of 
its origin and variety of development. The 
volcanic disturbances which have already been 
discussed as having been responsible for the 
various uplifts and depressions of the Black 
Hills region, and also for opening the fissures 
which gave the cave a beginning, must have 
supplied the conditions that were necessary to 
the formation of box work. And these prelimi- 
nary conditions were merely cracks in the rock. 
By the violence of earth movement the limestone 
has been crushed, probably when the land was 
undergoing depression, prior to the upheaval 
which opened the great parallel fissures. The 
varying hardness of the rock, as well as proxi- 
mity to the surface, would readily account for 
the difference in size of the fractures, which is 
from one-half inch to twelve inches; the largest 
being the most distant from the surface. That 
this crushing was done before the salt waters 
retired from the region, which was towards the 
close of the Cretaceous Age, is sutticiently evident 
in the fact that portions of the Red Beds show 
similar fractures with the cracks filled with 



Ozarks and Black Hills. 123 

gvpsum, and gypsum, as we have already seen, 
is a salt water deposit. 

After the crushing was done the cracks in the 
Carboniferous Limestone were filled with water 
heavily charged with calcium carbonate, taken 
in solution from the rock, first from pulverized 
particles, and afterwards by percolation and 
contact with exposed surfaces. This calcium 
carbonate was slowly deposited in crystalline 
form, so that in time the cracks were filled and 
the crushed rock firmly cemented with calcite 
seams. But in the meantime the removal of 
the calcium carbonate had started disintegration 
of the more exposed portions of the rock, which 
steadily continuing, finally reduced the porous 
body between the crystal seams to a soft clay 
w^hich was gradually dissolved and carried out 
through small imperfe'ctions in the thin crystal 
sheets, leaving the empty box \vork as we find 
it. But where blasting has exposed fresh sur- 
faces, much of the solid limestone carries the 
box-like sheets of crystal. 

The thinnest box work is seen in the upper 
levels, from which the waters retired soonest, 
and the heaviest and most beautiful is in the 
Blue Grotto, on the eighth level where the water 
remained longest and its diminished volume 
became most heavily charged. In many places, 
however, there is another heavy variety known 
as pop-corn box work, which seems to be an 



124 Cave Regions of the 

impure lime carbonate not so finely crystallized 
as the other, but at the time of my visit no 
explanation had been given of the manner of its 
deposit; and my own theory that it v;as not 
formed under water had nothing to sustain it 
until, a few weeks later, while visiting Crystal 
Cave, the Vv'ork was found in active progress on 
surfaces occupying every position, and the agent 
was dripping water. In all cases the original 
box work has been in thin sheets of Ciilcite, and 
the heavy varieties are due to later deposits 
of calcite and aragonite crystals or, pop corn. 
The colors are white, yellow, blue and choco- 
late brown ; the last named predominating to a 
great extent in that portion of the cave most eas- 
ily traveled by visitors, and forming the ceiling 
and a part of one wall in the Post Office, where, 
as has been said before, it first appears. The 
effect is not dreary as might be imagined, and 
j)arties are generally photographed here because 
one side of the room is vrhite and greatly- assists 
the flash. This is a smooth, perpendicular wall 
marking the line of the fissure and showing the 
strata of the rock in horizontal position whit- 
ened with a thin coating of carbonate of lime.* 
All visitors are cordially invited to please them- 
selves in leaving cards, letters or papers in this 
chamber, which is reserved for that purpose, 
and to refrain from leaving them in other por- 



Ozarks and Black Hills. 125 

tions of the cave or defacing the walls with 
names. 

Roe's Misery is a long, narrow passage into 
which, during the early times before its size had 
been increased by blasting, a large man named 
Roe crawled to his sorrow. Being larger than 
the hole he stuck fast, and neither his own elforts 
nor those of the guides could relieve the situation 
until a rope was sent for, and having been 
brought, was securely fastened to his feet, when 
a long pull and a strong one finally opened the 
passage. It is told that he claimed to have 
reviewed all the objectionable acts of his life, 
by which his friends understood that he occu- 
pied the motionless position not less than three 
weeks. 

Red Hall is very nearly described by its name 
and is quite a showy room, with the bright red 
walls contrasting sharply with their limited 
ornamentation of pure white carbonate of lime 
and pearly crystals of calcite. 

Off to one side of Red Hall is a beavitif ul little 
chamber called Old Maids' Grotto, probably on 
account of its trim appearance and ideal loca- 
tion. It is so entirely concealed from the view 
of those passing on the public highway, that its 
existence is not even suspected, until special 
attention is called to its cosiness, and then it is 
necessary to mount an accumulation of great 
water-rounded rocks in order to obtain con- 



126 Cave Begions. 

vincing evidence of its actual reality. It is a 
long, narrow room, shut in by a straight wall 
sufficiently high for rigid seclusion, or protec- 
tion, without preventing a glimpse of passing 
events. 

A break in the description is made here for 
the purpose of inserting a description, written 
at the author's request, by Mr. E. L. McDonald. 
He was generally our special guide. He has 
chosen to describe the route taken by the 
majority of visitors and therefore the balance 
of my observations within those limits are 
omitted. 

All who are familiar with those passages and 
chambers will observe while reading the next 
chapter that no imaginary attractions are added 
to the existing facts, but many interesting minor 
points are missing. 

Only such changes are made as were agreed to 
as the condition on which he would attempt a 
piece of work so at variance with his usual occu- 
pations. 



CHAPTER X. 

WIND CAVE CONTINUED. 
THE FAIR GROUNDS ROUTE. 

"At 9:30 m the morning the train bringing 
health-seekers and tourists arrives at Hot 
Springs, a beautiful little city nestled in the 
southernmost foot-hills of the world-reputed 
Black Hills of South Dakota. The choice of a 
hotel is soon made, and when located, the new- 
comers observe the other guests and acquaint 
themselves with the attractions of the resort. 
Probably during the day they are approached by 
the solicitor of the wonderful Wind Cave, who 
explains that the best way to reach the cave is 
by means of the coach and four seen at the hotel 
in the morning, and arrangements are made for 
the following day. The next morning, seated 
in the tally-ho coach with strangers who are 
soon acquaintances, you start on a beautiful 
twelve-mile drive to one of nature's most inter- 
esting sights. 

"Immediately after leaving town you begin to 
admire the scenery and enjoy the cool, refresh- 
ing breezes, wafted from the mountains to the 
north, down the slopes to the arid plains, 

127 



128 Cave Regions of the 

" After climbing a gently sloping 'hog-back' 
for about eight miles, you are at the top of the 
divide and one thousand feet higher than Hot 
Springs, which may be seen on the left. Look- 
ing ahead you can see Harney Peak, the highest 
mountain in the Black Hills district; and on the 
right you see Buffalo Gap, through which the 
creek runs that heads at Min-ne-pa-juta Springs. 
The Indians used to drive buffalo through this 
gap, hence its name. A small but thriving little 
town to the eastward takes its name from this 
Buffalo Gap. From here you begin to go down 
a gentle and winding incline to the cave, which 
is reached all too soon. 

"At the office you register and procure tickets, 
and then have from one-half to three-quarters of 
an hour in which to eat lunch or dine at the 
hotel. Then all congregate in the office, from 
whence the start is made, after every one has 
put on a cave cap, not a suit, as suck is entirely 
unnecessary. The guide leads the way to the 
entrance of the cave which is separated from the 
office by some little distance, and is located in 
the bed of a long since dry run, which in former 
times has bared the carboniferous strati, and 
within this kind of rock the cave is found. 

"As the author has asked me for an article de- 
scriptive of the cave, I will only attempt to say 
something of our medium length route to 
the Fair Grounds, or in other words, the Fair 



Ozarks and Black Hills. 129 

Grounds' Route. A collective description of the 
whole cave would take months — even years — to 
complete. Besides, the above route is the one 
most used by visitors at the present time. 

"On entering the Cave House (a log structure) 
you will in all probability ask from whence 
comes the murmur of a waterfall. The guide 
answers that it is the rushing current of air at 
the mouth of the cave, sometimes in and some- 
times out. Prof. J. E. Todd, in bulletin No. 1, 
S. Dakota Geological Survey, p. 48, says: 
' This phenomenon is found to correspond with 
the varying pressure of the barometer, and with its 
single opening and capacious chambers is easily 
accounted for.' 

' 'The rushing air is sometimes strong enough to 
require a man's weight to open the entrance 
door. Five days and nights is the longest time 
the wind has been known to move in one direc- 
tion without ceasing. This is one of nature's 
greatest atmospherical phenomena. 

"Some one says, 'Tickets, please!' and into 
the hole we go, single file down a lighted passage- 
way to where we can light our candles. After 
descending about one hundred and fifty-five feet 
we come into the Bridal Chamber (named by 
some of the earlier explorers before the present 
management took hold of the property), which 
is eight or ten feet in length by twenty feet in 
breadth. Passing along some distance, the 



130 Cave Regions of the 

Snow-ball Room is entered. It carries this name 
on account of little rosettes of carbonate of lime 
sticking to the irregular ceiling. This room is 
pretty narrow and some fifty feet in length. 

"The Post Office is next and soon reached. The 
ceiling is covered with the box work formation 
somewhat resembling Post Oflice boxes. You 
will no doubt wonder why it carries such a 
common name. 

' 'Just because after searching in what books on 
geology and other sciences we could get, 
we could not find it described nor any formation 
resembling it; hence its common name, as we 
have named the pop-corn work, frost work etc., 
from their appearance. 

"The dimensions of the Post Office are some 
eighty feet in length by twenty feet in width, with 
an average ceiling height of probably twelve 
feet. Red Hall is the room next in order, and 
has on either side a red bank of sandy, micaceous 
clay. 

"Just to the left is a very pretty little grotto of 
box work. This room is very odd in make-up. 
The floor is very rough and dips about fifteen 
feet in its length of sixty feet, and includes a 
short flight of stairs. The lowest end of the 
room is prettily decorated, and some pleasing 
blends of color attract the eye. To the left is 
the Old Maids' Grotto, a prett}'' little nook that 
would please any maid old or young. 



Ozarks and Black Hills. 131 

"After passing through the White Room we 
turn to the left along the crevice, and after 
traveling some little distance reach The Grand 
Opera, a very narrow room but some forty feet 
in length, Chopin's Nocturne is a small grotto 
in the right hand wall named by the famous 
violinist, Edouard Remenji. 

"The Devil's Lookout is reached by a few steps. 
It is a crevice about ten feet wide at the base 
and sixty-five feet in height. This place is 
remarkable for its columns of rock just over head. 
The pathway leads to Milton's Study, some 
fifty feet distant. Turning into the crevice 
again, some twenty feet are traveled w^hen at- 
tention is called to Seal Rocks. Sampson's Palace 
is the next room in order : here we see some 
stalagmitic water formation on the left wall and 
the ceiling is one of the most beautiful yet seen 
on the trip. 

"We pass along to Swiss Scenery, a very prettily 
decorated room fifty feet in length by fifteen in 
height. The box work is very pretty, shading 
from yellow to dark brown. The general appear- 
ance of the room would suggest its name, it 
being rougher than any other in the immediate 
vicinity. Passing under an arch. we enter the 
Queen's Drawing-room. , Here the. bo_x work has 
been developed beyond any on our pathway thus 
far. From the ceiling, it hangs like draperies 
and on the left M'all is about twenty-four inches 



182 Cnve Regions of the 

in depth. On the whole this room is elegant 
enough for the most exacting queen. We step 
from this room into the M. E. Church. Rev. 
Mr. Hancher, President of the Black Hills 
Methodist College, was I believe the first to 
hold song and prayer service in this room ; the 
pulpit is on the left as you pass through. The 
guides always ask if any wish to sing or worship, 
as any one has a perfect right in a dedicated 
Chapel. 

"The Giant's Causeway is only a few steps 
beyond. This bit of scenery has some resem- 
blance to the famed basalt attraction on the coast 
of Ireland. We 'duck' our heads under the 
Arch of Politeness and rise to a standing position 
in Lena's Arbor, a very irregular shaped room 
admired by a great many of our visitors. 

"We enter Capitol Hall at the side, about 
midway between the ends. It is the largest 
room yet visited, being some two hundred feet 
from end to end, with a very high ceiling. Here 
we notice the walls and ceiling are bare of box 
work and other formation, and are clean and 
white. The decorative appearance exceeds any 
room yet visited. After getting into line again 
we go down a flight of stairs to Odd Fellows' 
Hall, a chamber that on examination suggests its 
name. In the ceiling is situated the 'All seeing 
eye,' one of the emblems of that august body, 
and at a little distance the 'Three links;' also 



Ozarks and Black Hilts. 188 

in the ceiling, and just under the latter is sit- 
uated a rock very much resembling a goat. 
Attention is called to the first appearance of 
pop-corn work, a very peculiar formation resem- 
bling pop-corn after it has broken open, and in 
this part of the cave it is quite plentiful. 

"We now descend another flight of stairs into 
Turtle Pass, where a large turtle rests beside 
the path, and Just beyond is the Confederate 
Cross-roads, where the fissure is crossed by 
another forming a cross with perfect right angles. 
The right hand passage is used for specimens 
only; straight ahead leads to the Garden of Eden, 
the end of our shortest route; we take the left 
hand path and journey through Summer Avenue, 
some seventy feet in length, and reach the Scenes 
of Widow, a large and high room, beautifully 
decorated with box work and pop-corn. The 
ceiling and the left wall from floor to ceiling are 
fine box work. On the right you see dark space, 
as a very large portion of this room is unused, 
but we pass the Piper's Pig. List! The guide 
is pounding on the Salvation Army Drum, a 
large projecting rock that on being struck with 
the closed hand gives a sound very much like a 
bass drum. 

"After walking across a short plank we enter 
Kimball's Music Hall, a very beautiful room 
settled between two crevices and lined with box 
work. Viewing the ceiling from the fissure on 



134 Cave Regions of the 

the right it is seen to be smooth and fringed 
with pop-corn. In some places the boxes are 
closed, resembling finished honey-comb. Over 
head box work can be seen as high as the light 
penetrates. On the whole, I think this is the 
finest crevice in the explored cave. 

"Looking straight ahead j^ou wonder how the 
party can travel over such a road as presents 
itself to view, but the guide turns into an arch in 
the right hand wall and enters Whitney Avenue. 
After walking across the bridge over shadowy 
depths, our pathway lies for some fifty feet in 
one of the most interesting ovens in the cave, 
at the end of which we enter Monte Cristo's 
Palace by going down a flight of stairs. This 
room has the greatest depth beneath the surface 
of any of the Fair Grounds' Route, which is four 
hundred and fifty feet. In this room is noticed 
a decided change in the box work, which is 
much heavier than any seen, or that will be 
scene on this route, and the color is light blue. 

"I guess I will give the party a talk while we 
rest under Monte Cristo's Diamonds, a very 
sparkling cluster, about six inches in diameter, 
of silica crystals. 

"After studying the cave, it appears thai it 
did not form in the same manner as most others; 
on account of the absence of sink holes, the 
regular arrangement of the chambers, the regu- 
lar dip of the rock to the south-east from five to 



Ozarhs and Black Hills. 135 

ten degrees, and the regularity of the long ver- 
tical fissures running north-west south-east. In 
fact, the whole cave is made up of these fissures 
and it seems that the water has entered narrow 
crevices opened by some eruptive force. 

"You see small holes eaten in the ceilings and 
walls in every direction, which indicates that the 
water came from a higher level, and being under 
great pressure, wanted passage out. It seems the 
cave was a reservoir for a long time, then after the 
water stopped flowing in it slowly receded, and 
in settling the overcharged waters covered the 
rocks and specimens with a calcareous coating, 
very thin in the upper portions of the cave and 
getting thicker the deeper you go, giving evi- 
dence as you see, of slowly settling. Had the 
waters rushed out they would in all probability 
have left the rocks uneoated as in all other 
caves, with one exception, the Crystal Cave, 
some seventy-five miles to the north of Wind 
Cave. 

' 'As we have some more caves to see we must 
journey on. 

"Taking one last look at Monte Cristp's Dia- 
monds we pass into Milliner's Avenue, a very 
pretty avenue indeed with nearly as many colors 
as a milliner's show-window would present. 
About mid-way of this avenue we cross the 
bridge over Castle Garden, a room in the eighth 
tier beneath the surface. From this avenue we 



186 Cave Regions of the 

step into the Assembly Room. Here the 
formations are covered with a gj'psum crys- 
tal that sparkles with wonderful brilliancy. 
On the right is a passage leading to the Masonic 
Temple, a room that any body of Masons would 
be proud of could they hold lodge meetings in it. 
The passage on the left is the terminus of the 
Pearly Gates' Route, the longest developed route 
in the cave. After moving along some distance 
we see the Bad Lands, and then come into the 
Tennis Court. This room has the net in the 
ceiling and I suppose the party can furnish the 
raquet (racket). On the right hand side of this 
room there is tier upon tier of box work ; looking 
to the left, you shudder at the almost bottomless 
pit just beside the pathway. Here we take a rest 
preparatory to climbing up to the Marble Quarry, 
a task of two flights of stairs. This is a very 
large room and has the most uneven iloor, ceiling 
and walls of any that our visitors see, and is 
barren of specimens excepting in the first part 
over the stairs where there is some box work of 
very pretty structure and color. Some distance 
up the path we see on one side the Ghost of 
'She,' and on the other the Devil's Punch 
Bowl, a large rock with a basin-shaped hole 
about thirty-six inches across and sixteen inches 
deep, but lo! the bottom has been broken out: 
which is very appropriate as South Dakota is at 
present a prohibition state. A winding path is 



Ozarks and Black Hills. 137 

followed until attention is called to the Sheep's 
Head above an arch over the passage, and the 
ceiling here is of flint, the ledge of which is 
four inches thick, 

"Passing under the arch we enter Johnstone's 
Camp Ground, so named because Paul Alexan- 
der Johnstone camped in this room while accom- 
plishing the third of his greatest mind-reading 
feats, during which he remained in the cave 
seventy-two hours. He was locked in his room 
at the Evans Hotel while a committee secreted 
the head of a gold pin in the cave. On their 
return, after being blindfolded, he led them to 
the livery stable, and securing a team drove to 
the cave and found the pin in the Standing 
Rock Chamber, beyond the Pearly Gates, and 
then drove back to the city still blindfolded. 

"Down one short flight of stairs and we are in 
the Waiting Room, so called on account of per- 
sons waiting here while the rest of their party 
finished the trip by climbing up the Alpine Way. 
This difficult climb w^as made until the route was 
developed via the Marble Quarry. A steep 
pathway and one flight of stairs now bring us to 
the Ticket Office, and another short stairway 
leads into the room above, which is the Fair 
Grounds. We enter the right wing, which 
measures two hundred and six links in length 
and forty-nine in width at the narrowest place. 
We are now in the third level and no box work 



138 Cave Regions of the 

is seen, but the ceiling (which is low) shows 
many interesting fossils. The central dome is 
some fifty feet in height, and passing to the 
right the guide seats the party in such a position 
that the frost work on the wall can be seen to 
advantage. This is the largest part of the Fair 
Grounds and measures six hundred and forty- 
five links long, exclusive of the right wing, and 
has a width of fifty-three links, which with 
a number of wings added, makes it one of the 
largest under-ground rooms within American 
caverns. 

"A great many visitors look at their cuff -buttons 
when told we have twenty-five hundred rooms 
included in ninety-seven miles of passageways. 
Of course they do not understand how we get 
the mileage. In going to the Fair Grounds we 
travel about three miles. In each fissure there 
are eight levels, which makes twenty-four miles 
of cave from the entrance to the Fair Grounds. 

"Of the formations in the cave, the differ- 
ent kinds are on different levels, the stal- 
actites and stalagmites nearest the surface on 
the second, the frost work on the third. This 
formation is in most instances as colorless 
as snow. The mode of its formation is not 
thoroughly understood, but is found in such posi- 
tions as suggest its being formed by vapors 
overcharged as spoken of about the water. It is 
almost always on an over-hanging rock, over or 



Ozarks and Black Hills. 139 

near some fissure leading to a deeper portion of 
the cave. Box work in this level is scattering 
and fragile: in the fourth it is the prevailing 
formation : in the fifth it is heavier and a little 
darker ; in the sixth it varies in style and color, 
and pop-corn appears, a queer formation 
resembling pop-corn ready to eat. It is not so 
purely white here as in the lower levels, seventh 
and eighth. In the seventh the box work is 
heavier than any seen on the Fair Grounds' Route 
and the color is nearly blue, having a faded 
appearance. In this tier is also found a good 
deal of mineral wool, which must not be 
mistaken for asbestos. It sometimes 
attains a length of eighteen inches and at 
one place where it seems to come out of a hole 
two inches in diameter, and drops down like a 
grey beard, we have named it Noah's Beard. 

"In the eighth tier we find very beautiful for- 
mations of carbonate of lime, and the box work 
is decidedly , blue, the boxes larger, and their 
partitions one half inch thick. 

"We have been deeper than the eighth tier but 
in narrow crevices barely admitting a man of 
average stature. In these the calcareous coating 
is much thicker than in any higher portions of 
the cave, but very little sign of box work is 
seen. 

"Sometimes we make a comparison betweenthe 
cave and a sponge. Take for instance a sponge 



140 Cave Regions. 

as large as an apple barrel and there would be 
holes in it as big as a man's thumb and closed 
hand. Now take a sponge, four miles square 
and five hundred feet deep with holes in propor- 
tion to the little sponge, and you have an illus- 
tration of The Wonderful Wind Cave, of Custer 
County, South Dakota." 



CHAPTER XI. 

WIKD CAVE CONTINUED. 
PEARLY GATES AND BLUE GROTTO ROUTE. 

A very much longer, more beautiful, and also 
more difficult journey than the one just described 
may be taken by those in whom the desire to 
see is greater than 'the fear of fatigue, or possi- 
bly, some little danger. With this object in 
view the Fair Grounds' Route is followed 
through Monte Cristo's Palace and into Milli- 
ner's Avenue. Here we leave it by dropping off 
the bridge into a rough hole, which proves to be 
a passage descending into Castle Garden direct- 
ly beneath the Avenue, and a room of consider- 
able size, plentifully supplied with bowlders. 
Although interesting to visit, it has no 
points of such special merit as would seem to 
require a detailed account, the main importance 
attaching to it being the fact that it is the first 
portion of the eighth level visited. A little be- 
yond, however, is something quite new. The 
floor is covered with a light yellow crust of cal- 
cite crystal, sufficiently strong to bear the 
weight of a limited number of guests without 
much fracture. It generally gives a hollow 

141 



142 Cave Regions of the 

sound when struck, which is easily accounted 
for as there are small holes noticed by which 
steam evidently made its escape, and through 
these cavities can be seen but they are shallow. 
One place shows the crust broken up and with 
the edges of the pieces overlapped, like ice bro- 
ken by a sudden rise of back-water, and in 
this position they have been firmly cemented. 

This is where the slowly receding waters of 
the cave lingered in shallow pools above the 
small crevices long after the main portions had 
become dry. That the crust was formed on top 
of the water, instead of beneath its surface, has 
been proved by the only body of water now 
standing in the cave. This is called Silent 
Lake, and being situated on another route will 
be described in its proper place, but when dis- 
covered no water was visible nor its presence 
even suspected until the crust gave way under 
the weight of an explorer. The thin sheet of 
yellow calcite crystal thus broken was the same 
as that seen in great abundance in the now per- 
fectly dry eighth level. The gruduall}' decreas- 
ing volume of water has left a smooth yellow 
coat on portions of the walls where irregulari- 
ties or slopes were favorable, and at least one 
such place is vividly remembered if once seen. 
A steep incline of about fifteen feet leads to a 
small oval hole through the wall; towards this 
we crawled with no great eas3; but getting to 



Ozarks and Black Hills. 143 

the hole was far easier than going through it 
into a tiny cubby not high enough to sit comfort- 
ably upright in, and too small to permit an aver- 
age sized human being to turn around. Close on 
the left it is shut in by another wall pierced by 
two holes similar to that just passed, and each 
revealing a miniature chamber scarcely more 
than three feet in either direction and eighteen 
inches high. Being directed to examine the 
ceiling of the first, it was done with some diffi- 
"culty and much satisfaction, for there in the 
center was a most exquisite bit of art work, a 
circular disk of " drusy" quartz about twelve 
inches in diameter and having the appearance 
of a flat rosette of fine black lace, in open pat- 
tern with small diamonds thickly strung on everj'^ 
thread; a brilliant, sparkling mass of gems. 
After Mr. McDonald had carefully removed a 
geode from the other little chamber, he slid 
down into a fourth, the last of the diminutive 
suite, having sufflcitnt height to allow a sitting 
posture with raised head, and opened the small 
jewel case, while I examined the place it came 
from. Here all was calcite crystal heavily 
massed in various forms, and a harmony of blue 
and brown, with half a dozen round, unbroken, 
perfect geodes hanging from the ceiling like 
oriole nests. The geode taken proved on 
opening to be especially fine, being filled with 
pearly white calcite crystals of both the dog- 



144 Cave Regions of the 

tooth and nail-head forms, and was kindly 
presented to be added to the collection of cave 
specimens already purchased in town, to which 
were also added handsome pieces of " drusy" 
quartz, cave coral, and tufa and mineral wool. 

Following the guide I now slipped down into 
the larger nook just vacated, and saw with con- 
siderable chagrin that the next step was down a 
perpendicular wall more than ten feet in height, 
facing a high, narrow fissure, the floor of which 
was merely two shelves sloping to an open space 
along the middle, almost two feet wide, with the 
darkness of continuing crevice below. Further 
progress seemed absolutely impossible. All 
things are, however, possible to those who will, 
and it had been willed to pay a visit to the 
grandest portion of Wind Cave. In order to 
do so the descent mu^t be made and was. Then 
some little distance must be traveled along the 
crevice, but the angle of elevation taken by 
both sides of the bisected floor served as a sort 
of prohibitory tax together with the calcite pav- 
ing, since to maintain an upright position on 
such a surface would require long training of a 
certain professional character. That difficulty, 
too, was overcome by placing a foot on either 
side of the open crevice ; the first consideration, 
of course, being safety and not grace. 

We now came to the enjoyment of the reward 
of merit. Flooded with the brilliant white 



Ozarks and Black Hills. 145 

light of magnesium ribbon, the crevice walls 
could be seen drawing together at a height of 
sixty-five feet, and both composed entirely of 
larger box work than any seen before and very 
heavily covered with calcite crystal, colored a 
bright electric blue and glowing with a pearly 
lustre. This is the Centennial Gallery, and 
leaving it with reluctance we passed on into the 
Blue Grotto to lind it finer still. It is some- 
what wider and higher, while even the ex- 
tremely rough, uneven floor shows no spot bare 
of heavy box work of a yet deeper blue. 

The wonderful beauty of this Blue Grotto 
necessarily stands beyond comparison because 
in all the known world there is nothing like it. 
The forms of crystal are chiefly aragonite. 

From here we pass to the " Chamber de Nor- 
cutt," which would be considered a very hand- 
some room if it had no superiors: and the same 
can be said of Union College, in which, however, 
is the Fan Rock to claim special notice; an 
immense piece of fallen box work shaped like a 
lady's fan half opened. 

An imposing vestibule leads into the extensive 
but rather dreary Catacombs, from which we 
crawled through a little hole into the M. W. A. 
Hall, emerging at the top of a steep but not 
high slope covered with the smooth yellow crust 
of calcite encountered at other places, and in 
trying to make a dexterous turn so as to go down 



146 Cave Regions of the 

feet first, the descent was accomplished with 
uncalculated suddenness and an unsought but 
liberal collection of bruises. This, however, 
was not a happening of the unexpected and 
could have no attention amid scenes of wonder 
and beauty, and we were close to the Geysers. 
From a scientific point of view this is the most 
important portion of the cave, for here is an 
indisputable proof that the water in the cave 
was hot and that it was subject to geyser action. 
The surrounding region is covered with the 
crust already described, and at the top of a gen- 
tle elevation is thrown up in the unmistakable 
form of geyser cones ; there being two near 
together on the surface described, with a third 
visible through one of these on a slightly lower 
level, this one being a new discovery, as it had 
escaped observation until we called attention to 
it. 

These small cones show that after the degree 
of heat and the volume of water had become 
reduced to the merest fraction of their former 
greatness, they continued their accustomed 
work here in the depth of the earth long after 
the once grand old geyser had ceased to show 
an outward sign of life. When the water fin- 
ally became so reduced even here that the steam 
could no longer force it through, or to these 
latest vents, the last rising vapors fringed their 
edges with a beautiful snow-white border of 



Ozarks and Black Hills. 147 

crystallized carbonate of lime as fine and soft 
as a band of swan's down, which it resembles. 
In the pure, still atmosphere of the eighth level, 
almost five hundred feet beneath the entrance, 
this silent proof of ancient action will endure 
for the admiration and instruction of many 
generations yet to come. Few mortals will ever 
be honored with memorials so lasting or so con- 
vincing of vanished power. 

Proceeding on the Journey the next chamber 
is the A. 0. U. W. Hall, a large, irregular room, 
by the rise of which a return to the seventh level 
is accomplished; and the next entered is the 
Tabernacle, not at all resembling the last, al- 
though a similar description would be correct. 

Now is reached what many consider the cave's 
greatest charm, The Pearly Gates. And mar- 
velously beautiful it certainly is. 

Approaching by a slightly lower level, we see 
a gateway opening between large rocks that 
light up with the soft lustre and varied tints of 
mammoth pearls. A wonderful efi'ect is pro- 
duced by the white calcite crystal spread in un- 
equal thickness over the dark surface of the 
encrusted rocks. Just without the gate is a 
short but not golden stairway leading to it, 
and immediately within is the Saint's Rest, a 
chamber of moderate size beautified by another 
great rock on which are combined the warm, 
pearly glow of calcite and the cold glitter of 



148 Cave Bey ions of the 

frost by- the later addition of lime carbonate 
vapor-crystals to the calcium carbonate aragon- 
ite. 

Next beyond is the chamber containing the 
Standing Eoek behind which Mr. Johnstone 
made his famous discovery of the concealed pin- 
head. It is an immense great fallen rock on 
whose dark surface are scattered transparent 
flake-like crystals of satin spar, resembling 
the congealed drops of a summer shower. 
The mind-reader entered the chamber by the 
way we shall leave it. 

Returning to the spot from which the Pearly 
Gates were first viewed, we stand facing the 
most beautiful of this imposing group of brilliant 
scenes, The Mermaid's Resort. This is a small 
cove with wave marks in the white beach sand, 
above which rises a projecting, sheltering cliff 
as purely white as freshly fallen snow, with a 
fine deposit of frost work in thick moss-like 
patterns two and three inches deep. 

This crystalline mass, so white aiid fragile, 
has to perfection the appearance of hoar-frost 
about a steam-vent in extremely cold weather, 
and was, no doubt, formed in a somewhat simi- 
lar manner. It is crystallized carbonate of lime, 
and could have been deposited in such extremely 
delicate forms only b}'' the heavily charged 
vapors rising from hot water. No one needs to 
be told that hot water will take and ht)ld in 



Ozarks and Black Hills. 149 

solution a much larger quantity of solid matter 
than is possible to cold water, with all other con- 
ditions the same; nor is it news that a portion 
of the solid substance is carried off in the rising 
steam. Now the geyser cones, so recently visi- 
ted on the next lower level, prove both the heat 
of the water and its heavy charge of solids, 
which gave it a far more intense heat than pure 
water could have equaled, and this in turn drove 
the steam to greater distances than otherwise it 
would have reached. , When cooled to such a 
point as to be reduced to a light vapor, its move- 
ment was checked by various walls, projections, 
and ceiling as were in its upward path, and 
these received the minute particles of burden, 
while the somewhat brisk motion of the atmos- 
phere, occasioned at these points by the mixing 
of that of higher temperature from below with 
the lower from above, is responsible for the 
dainty and varied forms assumed by the fragile 
structure. 

Once more resuming the Journey, we admire 
the rugged charms of University Heights, a 
somewhat larger and higher room than the next, 
St. Dominic's Chamber, but perhaps not more 
interesting than the Council Chamber, which 
besides other attractions is to some extent also a 
Statuary Hall. From the Council Chamber the 
Alpine Way leads up into the Fair Grounds 
directly above. This Alpine Way is a sort of 



150 Cave Begions. 

cork-screw twisting through the rocks, not unlike 
a badly walled well, assisted at the lowest por- 
tion by a short and nearlj' pe pendicuhir ladder. 
Next is the Assembly Room, or Crown Chamber, 
us it is also called on account of a handsome 
crown conspicuously placed. This room also 
contains a Moose so perfectly carved that the 
skeptic who searches diligently for imperfections 
finally clamors for the whole compan}^ to cele- 
brate his discovery of the artist's noble skill. 

Leaving this room we re-enter ^Milliner's 
Avenue and soon cross the bridge from which, a 
few hours ago, wedecendedinto the eighth level 
by way of Castle Garden ; and now the return to 
the surface is by the route followed before, and 
we arrive there at last terribly weary, but more 
than well pleased. 




Top of Glacier. 
Page 155.^ 



CHAPTER XII. 

WIND CAVE CONCLUDED, 
GARDEN OF EDEN, THE GLACIER, AND ICE PALACE. 

There is yet another long and charming line 
of travel open to, those who have sufficiently 
steady heads and light feet to suffer no loss of 
confidence or depression of spirit when mounting 
the steep stairway whose limit seems lost in the 
dark distance above. 

There being but the single entrance, a repeti- 
tion of the worn and ancient statement that all 
roads lead to Rome, means that many journeys 
may be taken in Wind Cave, but all must have 
the same beginning. 

In the tourist season the guides have not 
time during the day to bring out specimens to 
supply the demand, so on this account night 
trips are of frequent occurrence ; and on these 
occasions the number of persons in all that vast 
space seldom' exceeds half a dozen, but their 
voices and laughter, and the blows of their ham- 
mers, can be heard at greater distances than 
Would seem possible, and give an agreeable sense 
of companionship; yet the voice does not travel 
by any ngieans so far as in other caves. 

161 



152 Cave Regions of the 

The evening we were to make the long trip 
just mentioned, our guide being ready before 
any others had gone in, we started the advance on 
the ninety-seven miles of enclosed, unoccupied 
space and had almost reached the level of the 
Bridal Chamber whea. he remembered a forgot- 
ten and necessary roll of magnesium ribbon, for 
which it was needful to return to the office in the 
upper building. I sat down on the lowest step 
of the great stairway to wait, and for a very 
short time was entirely alone in the largest 
cavern in the world, excepting the Mammoth Cave 
of Kentucky, 

The unexpected experience seemed suddenly 
to become one of the great events of a lifetime, 
and was unmarred by the disturbing apprehen- 
sions of any possible danger. The entire 
absence of sound was indescribably awe-inspir- 
ing as 

" Strata overleaping strata from the center 

to the crust, 
Rose, Alp-high, in molten silence, as the 

dead rise from the dust;" 

but the feeling of complete isolation from the 
living world would not require an unlimited 
time to merit the one word — horrible. Even 
some peril with ample companionship would be 
more agreeable, while it is a curious fact that 
the combination of companionship with silence 
is charming. On the occasion of one visit" to 
the cave it was painful to observe the actual 



Ozarks and Black Hills. 158 

suffering of a lover of quiet, from the good- 
natured, but heedless, chatter of two of the 
party. 

Presently steps on the stairs broke the still- 
ness, a glimmer of light pierced the intense 
darkness that surrounded the circle of one 
candle, and the upper world seemed not so far 
away. 

The interrupted journey was resumed, the 
route being that already described as far as the 
Confederate Cross Roads, where, this time, we 
go straight on in the main fissure instead of 
turning into the cross-crevice, as was done before. 

We were overtaken by the specimen party and 
recognized the three laughing young girls only 
by their voices, as in full suits of overalls and 
white duck caps, they looked like boys. Those 
who reside near the large caves have overcome 
their objection to this costume, as it gives mucli 
greater freedom and ease of movement, besides 
being a decided economy. Feminine garments 
are so easily destroyed, but for artistic effect 
the substitute cannot conscientiously be recom- 
mended. 

Beyond the Cross Roads the first chamber is 
Breckinridge Gallery, a long, rambling hall in 
which are combined the attractions already 
passed and those yet to come, but having no 
striking feature predominating to give .special 
character other than the grandeur of extreme 



154 Cave Regions of the 

roughness, which is also the quality most ob- 
served on passing into the Stone Quarry, where 
great accumulations of blocks seem waiting pre- 
paration for shipment. 

The next " open country " is protected from 
public trespass by the Garden Wall, which 
appears to have been well built in the long ago 
by masons properly trained in their craft, and 
extends, at a uniform height, to the Fallen 
Flats, where tlie floor is covered with slabs of 
enormous size that have fallen from the ceiling 
since water occupation ceased, as is clearly 
shown by the sharp edges and surfaces entirely 
unworn. 

The journey now becomes more interesting as 
the Clitf-Climbers' Delight is reached, and we 
go steadily up the long flights of stairs until 
visions of St. Peter begin to rise and we wonder 
which way the key will turn. Near the top is a 
handsome growth of snow-white mold hanging 
in long draperies behind the ladder or spread 
like an asparagus fern flattened against the 
rock. 

Arrived at the top limits of the stairs the 
ascent is by no means finished, but continues 
through three large chambers known as Five 
Points, the Omaha Bee Office — named by one of 
the staff of that well known journal — and the 
AV. C. T. U. Hall, dedicated to the service of 
(he organization b}- one of its workers. 



Ozarks and Black Hills. 155 

At last the upward journey is ended at the 
Silent Lake in the first, or highest, level. This, 
as has already been observed, is the only body 
of water now standing in the cave, and is not 
more than ten feet long by six in width and 
twelve inches deep. The scanty volume is 
maintained by the very limited inflow of acidu- 
lated percolating water which reaches the small 
receiving basin charged with calcium carbonate; 
and being cold, the charge is being precipitated 
on the bottom instead of forming a crust over 
the surface as in former times when the control- 
ling influence was a degree of heat sufficient to 
sustain solid matter without disturbing motion. 

Rising above the Silent Lake is the Glacier, 
its moist surface suggesting that the lake is fed 
by a slight thaw, while the perpendicular front 
at the water's edge gives the impression of a 
berg having recently broken off and floated 
away. 

The Glacier flows between two high walls of 
dark rock, and the steep incline of perhaps 
seventy feet, covered with a smooth deposit of 
calcite and shining with moisture, has the 
appearance of ice and is as uninviting for a 
climb. The top is connected wdih the roof 
above by a group of short, and for this region, 
heavy columns of dripstone, the oldest forma- 
tion of that character in the cave. 

An occasional overflow of the lake passes out 



156 Cave Regions of the 

to one side, then turns and goes iinder the 
Glacier where its first few feet of descent are 
called the Pearl Beds, where a variety of water- 
polished pebbles are being coated over and 
cemented together with calcite crystal. 

From the Glacier down to the lowest level oC 
the cave by another route than that taken for 
the ascent, there is abundant evidence that at 
one time this portion of the cave was subject to 
excessively violent activity, and if studied with 
a view to the penetration of the principle of 
geyser action, offers many interesting and 
valuable suggestions that can be added to and 
expanded into definite theories in connection 
with the balance of the cave; all important 
requirements are clearly shoAvn. 

At a short distance from the Glacier is a small 
circular dome, called the Picture Gallery, which 
evidently was shaped by water forced up from 
below. The descent from here takes us into the 
St. Louis Tunnel, a long rough passage leading 
down into the great Cathedral, by the still de- 
scending irregularities of which we finally reach 
the Garden of Eden, the objective point of a 
favorite tourist route, but usually approached 
from the opposite direction. It is a large 
chamber of very irregular shape, with an ex- 
tremely uneven ceiling, dipping nearly to the 
floor and rising suddenly to distant heights, 
while every portion of all the varied surfaces 



Ozarks and Black Hills. 157 

glitters with a mass of frost work in every form 
it is known to have assumed; the banks of 
orange buds in different stages of expansion 
being exceptionally handsome. A portion of 
this wonderful room especially admired is 
Cupid's Alcove, where the frost is tinged with 
a pinkish flush from the brilliant paint clay 
captured in minute particles by the vapors. The 
whole room is a marvel of loveliness, but unfor- 
tunately visitors have wrought such noticeable 
damage that wire screening must be placed 
before the general admittance of large parties 
can be resumed. 

Passing out and down to a lower level, by way 
of Jacob's Well, we find the source of that 
magnificent abundance of frost work to be in 
the Chamber of Forbidden Fruit, where a yellow 
calcite floor-crust indicates the surface level of 
water diminishing in volume by evaporation long 
after the upward flow had forever ceased, and 
from which the rising vapor ascended to decor- 
ate the Garden of Eden, just described. But 
since this water completely disappeared, leaving 
in evidence only the record-bearing crust, a 
percolating drip has prepared indisputable proof 
of the remote distance of that time by depositing 
on the crust great clusters of luscious fruits, 
chiefly cherries, which appear to have been care- 
lessly tossed down in heaps, but are firmly fixed 
in place. 



158 Cave Ttegiona of the 

The onward journey continues up and down 
through Beacon Heights, a large chamber which 
imitates Rocky Mountain scenery and terminates 
at the Corkscrew Path wliich, as the name indi- 
cates, is a spiral path winding down like a great 
stairway against the wall of an approximately 
circular chamber which is perhaps the highest 
in the cave, and shows the most violent water- 
action. The plunging torrent rushed on from 
here to tear out the heavy rock and form the 
next chamber, known as Dante's Inferno, whence, 
its force being divided, it went more gentl}- in 
various directions. And by one of these pas- 
sages we now re-enter the main route of travel 
once more, and finally return to the face of the 
earth, wondering if it will be possible to so de- 
scribe those wonderful scenes as to represent 
with even a limited degree of fairness or justice 
the awe-inspiring grandeur of the entire trip, or 
the perfection of fragile loveliness formed and 
preserved as by special miracles in the Garden 
of Eden. 

One peculiarity of this great journey'' was that 
the box work, so abundant in other portions of 
the cave, was here conspicuously absent. 

THE CRYSTAL I'ALACK. 

Another route in Wind Cave is that to the Crys- 
tal Palace which, although the shortest, is the 
one most seldom taken by visitors, because of a 



Ozarks and Black Hills. ■ 159 

certain amount of difficulty and discomfort being 
unavoidable. Only a portion of the great stair- 
way below the entrance is descended, when we 
abandon it and climb into a hole in the side-wall 
of the narrow passage, from which point to the 
end of the trip our feet prove to be merely en- 
cumbrances. 

The space crawled into and through widens 
sufficiently in several places to form chambers 
of good size, but the height of the ceiling is no- 
where more than three feet and most of it only 
two or even less. The rough rock floor is partly 
carpeted with patches of loose moist clay, which 
is the means of our becoming as grimy as tramps, 
and its source is readily accounted for by an ex- 
amination of the ceiling. This is easily made 
while resting one skinned elbow at the expense of 
the other. The word "abraded" is inadequate 
where anything approaching real cave study is 
attempted. 

The box work of the ceiling has almost en- 
tirely lost its crystallization, and is as ready to 
crumble as the enclosed clay, which is still 
retained because it had not yet reached the 
necessary point of deterioration to be carried 
out before the great volume of water, required 
for that service, retired from this high level of 
the cave. 

When finally reached, the Crystal Palace 
proved worthy of the effort, its decoration being 



160 Cave Regions of the 

entirely of dripstone and very beautiful, although 
on too small a scale to be compared with similar 
work in many caves: it is merely an attractive 
"extra" in Wind Cave, and not one of the 
important attractions that give the Cave the 
rank that may have a few equals but no superiors. 

The first room is scarcely more than twelve 
feet in either direction and not quite six feet 
high. The glassy ceiling is thicklj'- studded 
with small stalactites from two to eighteen inches 
in length, and mostly of the hollow "pipe- 
stem" variety, from which the surplus drip 
rests in white masses on the clean floor around 
a central bowl of good clear water. 

Down the middle of the wall directly oppo- 
site the entrance a rushing little white cascade 
has congealed, and on either side just under 
the ceiling is a hollowed-out nook closely set 
with short stalactites and small columns, all pure 
white. 

Near by but not connected is another room too 
well filled to permit an entrance, but a por- 
tion of the wall having been carried out a satis- 
factory view is not denied. Here the floor rises 
to within three feet of the ceiling, and the de- 
posit is much heavier, so that many fine col- 
umns rise from bases that spread and meet or 
overlap. If the cave had no greater claim to 
notice than these small drip rooms, it would 
still be worthy of a visit. 



Ozarks and Black Hills. 161 

The effort to secure flash-light pictures could 
only be considered successful because there are 
none better to be had. 

The atmosphere of Wind Cave is marvelously 
fresh and pure, and possesses in a high degree 
the invigorating quality which in most caves 
renders unusual exertion not only possible, 
but agreeable as well. In all the chambers and 
passages there is little change in the quality of 
the air, and thorough tests with a standard 
thermometer showed the variations on the dif- 
ferent levels, from the highest to the lowest, to 
be about 2°; but on different days the range 
was from 4-5° to 52°. This curious state of 
affairs some one else will have to explain. 

The only forms of life ever found in Wind 
Cave are a small fly and the mountain rat. 

While visiting the cave, every one connected 
with it was most kind and obliging, especially 
in showing those beautiful and difficult por- 
tions that few visitors are so fortunate as to see. 
While this is very far from being a complete 
description even of the parts visited, it will 
serve to show what a truly grand cavern is lo- 
cated at the south end of the Black Hills. 

The elevation at Hot Springs is three thousand, 
four hundred feet, and that of the entrance to the 
eave is four thousand and forty feet. A source of 
disappointment in connection with Wind Cave is 
that its fine scenery cannot be effectively pictured 



CHAPTER XIII. 

THE ONYX CAVES. 

Northwest of Hot Springs there is a group of 
three onyx caves, the distance to them being 
estimated at from seven to ten miles, if the 
party does not get lost, which is the usual fate 
of those who dispense with the service of a 
driver familiar with the country. In going, the 
longer way, over the hill- tops, claims a prefer- 
ence on account of distant views with a favora- 
ble light. When the Onyx Cave Ranch is 
reached its scenery is found to be charming, 
with an ideal log house overlooking the canon, 
and itself overlooked by the rising slope of the 
wooded hill. The entrance to the cave is in the 
opposite wall of the canon, and is covered by a 
small cabin, at the door of which the view 
demands a pause for admiration; then the 
party disappears down a narrow, rough, 
sloping passage of sufficient height for comfort 
to none but know the value of comparative de- 
grees. It soon appeared, however, that personal 
comfort would travel only a short distance. 
The mud increased with every step, and in its 
midst was a small hole through which it was 
necessary to pass to the next lower level. This 
i«a 



OzarJcs and Black Hills. 163 

hole being so small and its walls slanting, the 
only way to accomplish the first half of the 
descent was to sit down in the mud and slide, 
stopping half way to examine a fine ledge of 
beautiful striped onyx, white and a brownish 
pink, the first outcrop in the cave, but in the 
next level it is seen in rich abundance and vari- 
ety; the colors being red, black and white, 
brown in several shades and pure white. All 
are handsome and of commercial quality and 
hardness; and just above them is a ledge of fine 
blue marble. 

The next chamber is called the Bad Lands, on 
account of a certain resemblance to that deso- 
late region. The way into it is through the 
Devil's Corkscrew, a most uninviting passage 
because it stands on tnd and is about twelve 
feet deep with circular, perpendicular walls dis- 
couragingly free of prominent irregularities; but 
careful study reveals a few available crags and 
rough edges, by which the descent is made. 
Fortunately the party decreased in size just 
within the entrance. Climbing up into a hole 
in the wall of this room, with no little difficulty, 
the Aerial Lake is the rev/ard of a breathless 
upward struggle, and a satisfying one. The 
Lake is very small, but under its clear surface 
can be seen numerous growing deposits of cal- 
cite, while the roof of onyx gleams with a mass 
of small white stalactites. 



164 Cave Regions of the 

Returning again to the main route and travel- 
ing to the end of a short passage we beheld the 
entrance to Red Hall, a piece of rope ladder 
dangling half way down a perpendicular wall, 
the other half having no help whatever. The 
way was clear so far as the length of the ladder, 
and with trust in the fut\ire soon learned in 
cave work that distance was at once passed, 
and sitting on the very narrow ledge to cogitate 
on the possibility of further progress, Mr. Sid- 
ey solved the problem by suggesting, rather 
doubtfully, that the easiest way would be to 
drop off and allow him to interrupt the fall. 
This method had twice proved the only means of 
advance in Wind Cave and can be termed rapid 
transit. The walls of Red Hall are of stratified 
limestone variegated with patches of red rock, 
and clay of the same gay hue. It is the highest 
chamber in the cave and probably the largest. 
A hole in the wall at the floor level, near the 
entrance to the passage beyond, gives a glimpse 
of the cave river flowing on a slightly lower 
level, not over two feet below the floor we stand 
on. The water is said to have a depth of fifteen 
feet, and a rock thrown in gave back the sound 
of a splash into water not shallow. Entering 
the passage already referred to, its dimensions 
decreased to a crawl and then to a squeeze, so 
that most of its length was taken in a very 
humble position, which permitted no regard to 




Faikies' Palace. 
Page 16a. 



Ozarks and lilack Hilts. 165 

be paid to the ample mud or little pools of water 
that must be serenely dragged through as if 
carrying them away were an agreeable privilege. 
Even a muddy passage ends in time, and at last 
we gained a standing point and after a short 
climb were in Fairies' Palace, a marvel of dainty 
beauty, and worthy of the distasteful trip just 
taken. We stood in a narrow passage that 
divided the small chamber like the central aisle 
of a cathedral, above which the white roof 
formed a Gothic arch from which depended 
countless little stalactites and draperies, while 
on either side, six feet above the passage, was 
a floor of onyx supporting exquisite columns of 
which the highest are not more than three feet. 
Only a short distance from the Fairies' Palace is 
the almost equally beautiful Ethereal Hall, and 
connecting the two I had the pleasure to discov- 
er a small arched passage more beautiful than 
either. 

Although much of the cave was still not visi- 
ted, the long drive to town demanded a return 
to the surface, but several stops were made on 
the way to admire masses of onyx and groups of 
curious forms in deposits of that fine stone. 
One high, crooked chimney above the Corkscrew 
is especially fine and correspondingly difficult 
for a grown person weighted down with gar- 
ments dripping mud and water ; but Kimball 
Stone, our boy friend, scampered up like a squirrel. 



166 Cave Regions of the 

Two of the Onyx Caves had not been seen at 
all and Mr. Sidey expressed special regret on 
account of the latest discovery as no woman had 
ever yet entered it; but the sun was low in the 
west and the road had some dangerous points 
that must be passed before dark, so the reeking 
skirt was removed and without waiting to dry 
by the great fire kindled for the purpose we 
hurried off, promising to return if possible, and 
carrying treasures in specimens, besides an an- 
cient lemon, which may not be called a fossil, 
since soft substances are said not to fossilize ; 
but however that may be, this is a perfect lemon 
whose particles have been replaced with the 
lasting rock in the same way as the numerous 
Cycad trunks in the same region have been pre- 
served to prove to us conclusively that former- 
ly the region flourished under tropical condi- 
tions, and supported an abundant animal life of 
tropical nature and habits. 

Soon after leaving the ranch, we descended 
by a sort of goat-trail-road into a grandly beau- 
tiful canon, along the bed of which the road 
continues until it flows out as the water did in 
ages gone. By this time it had become quite 
dark, and the chill of the northwest night formed 
a combination with saturated clothing that can- 
not be highly recommended as a jjleasure ; but 
the natural chivalry which prompted our young 
escort to insist on lending his own coat, and his 



Ozarks and Black Hills. 167 

evident disappointment that the sacrifice was 
not allowed, afforded a pleasure that will con- 
tinue. 

THE WHITE ONYX CAVE. 

A few days later it was convenient to return 
to the Onyx Cave ranch with the special object 
of entering the newest cave, which could be 
done with the assistance of seventy feet of rope. 
While necessary preparations were pending, a 
walk up the canon was proposed. At a distance 
of perhaps a quarter of a mile above Onyx Cave 
evidence was seen of a very remarkable form of 
ancient life. It is not the usual few bones but 
is a cast in the rock of the canon bed of an ani- 
mal clothed in its flesh. The appearance of the 
head, neck, body and wings is preserved, but 
the tail and four limbs have been carried away 
by eroding waters which even now have not 
quite forsaken the canon. The containing 
stratum is not seen in the canon wall, and near 
the lower end of the canon a fine white sand- 
stone crops out beneath. We ask: " Was the 
canon cut to its full depth while yet a Cretaceous 
sea was depositing beach-sand, and did the ear- 
]iest horse, with wings, appear at the close of 
that period? Or, did an animal with fore limbs 
di veloped, retain its wings into Miocene time 
and leave record of its life in an arm of the Ter- 
tiary lake? " The body is that of a horse with 
wings attached to the shoulders. The head is 



168 Cave Regions of the 

unlike that of a modern horse, being much 
shorter and more rounded, but the parted lips 
give a glimpse of the teeth of a young horse. If 
only the feet could be found, I feel assured they 
would prove that the three-toed horse of ancient 
time, so abundant!}' in evidence throughout this 
region, was possessed of wings and in some way 
furnished the idea of Pegasus. 

A few feet further down the canon are a pair 
of twisted wings that show the animal to have 
perished in company with its mate, while trying 
to escape from a sudden flood that rushe^ down 
the cafion like a moving wall. 

After some uneasy discussion about the means 
of entering the new cave, it was finally decided 
that the available rope was too short and not of 
sufficient strength. This was, of course, a dis- 
appointment but not a surprise, as a very 
peculiar quality in the rope used to enter caves 
of this kind had come to notice before. The 
peculiarity is, that a rope entirely above sus- 
picion for the saftty of a two hundred pound 
man, at once weakens and must be condemned 
when threatened with one liundred pounds of 
woman's weight, yet there is an implied compli- 
ment hidden somewhere about this protective 
system that tends to reduce the sting of disnp- 
pointment. 

So it was agreed to spend the afternoon in the 
White Onyx Cave, which is generally spoken of 




White Onyx Masses. 

Page 170. 



Ozarks and Black Hills. 169 

simply as the Upper Cave because it occupies a 
liigher level than the Onyx Cave already 
described, and is supposed to be an extension of 
the same although no connecting passage has 
been discovered. 

The accompanying friend had not been 
costumed for caving, but was persuaded to accept 
a full suit of overalls, which needed the addition 
of a pick and pipe to make the picture perfect. 
Unfortunately a snap shot failed. 

The entrance is in a perpendicular portion of 
the canon wall, but a narrow path that starts 
some distance away and appears in eminent 
danger of falling off, makes most of the ascent 
comparatively easy; and the balance is completed 
by a short ladder whose rounds dip toward the 
canon bed in a rather alarming manner, but this 
only proves the folly of giving too much heed to 
appearances, for it is strong and firmly fastened 
to the rocks. 

Just within the entrance there is height 
sufficient for standing, but the roof descends 
suddenly and the walls come near together, 
reducing the passage to a crawl, and showing 
that in past times water poured in at this open- 
ing and not out as might be supposed. The first 
chamber entered is the Crystal Gallery, but it is 
so nearly filled with great masses of pure white 
onyx no standing room remains. Drops of 
water on portions of the onyx ceiling here are 



170 Cave Regions of the 

the only moisture remaining in this cave. When 
Mac's* head came in contact with the roof he 
called to the guide: " See here, little boy, you 
ought to sing out ' low bridge ' at that sort o' 
places, 'cause when I'm busy hunting a spot to 
set my foot in, I can't see what my head's com- 
ing to, and I like to mined a lot o' this rock 
with it." 

Slowly, and with no danger and less comfort, 
we creep over, under and between great massive 
beds of the fine white crystalline rock until at 
length we enter the Ghost Chamber where no 
onyx has been deposited, but where numerous 
mountain rats have evidently been at home for 
many years, if we may judge from the enormous 
quantity of pine needles with which they have 
carpeted the floor. The walls show small box 
work crumbling to dust, and Ray climbed high 
into the chimney-like opening above our heads, 
but reported that it ended suddenly and had no 
attractions to offer. 

Coming out, the way was somewhat varied, 
but more difficult, as the passages through the 
onyx beds were more irregular and more nearly 
closed; Onyx Hall being only a fair specimen of 
the marvelous results achieved here by the per- 
sistent i-egularity of an uninterrupted but slow 
drip, continued through hundreds of years. 

It is surprising that in all these heavy beds 

♦Colored driver. 




Looking out of White Onvx Cave. 

Page 171 



Ozarhs and Black Silts. 171 

there is no line or tint, or slightest trace of color 
anywhere, while the other Onyx Cave, so near as 
to suggest connection, has a gorgeous variety of 
rich coloring. 

The view looking out from the entrance of 
White Onyx Cave is wonderfully fine, and 
equally so whether the rain falls or the sun 
shines, a timely shower giving us an opportunity 
to enjoy both. 

Before leaving the ranch, a promise was made 
by Mr. Sidey to write a short description of 
the other cave, which he kindly did, and it is 
here given. He says: 

" In trailing a deer I came across a hole on top 
of a long divide. On throwing a rock down the 
opening, I could hear it rattling against the 
walls until the sounds gradually died away, but 
there seemed to be no bottom to the hole, and I 
resolved to come again prepared and make 
explorations. After the snow had gone my 
twelve year-old son, Ray, and I, mounted on our 
trusty horses, Bonnie and Dee, equipped with 
ropes, candles, ham-ners and a pocketful of 
matches, set out to explore the new cave. It 
was a beautiful, bright spring morning, and 
after an hour's hard climbing over fallen timber 
and rocks, we reached the summit of the 
mountain. A search of half an hour revealed 
the opening which was barely large enough to 
allow me to pass through. 



172 Cave Regions of the 

"Fastening our ropes securely to a stout log 
rolled across the chasm, we began to pay it out, 
and although we did not feel it touch bottom, I 
started down to explore, the length of the rope 
at least. As I descended I found the opening 
gradually widened out to eight or ton feet, a sort 
of inverted funnel-shaped hole with irregular 
wall but smooth and affording little footing. As 
I neared the bottom I saw the end of the rope 
was within four feet of it, so I landed on terra 
firma and called to Ray, ' All right, come 
down ! ' 

"Lighting our candles we found ourselves 
standing on a mound of pure onyx, and on look- 
ing around could see we were in an immense 
cavern, whose walls sparkled and glittered as if 
studded with diamonds. Going down twenty 
feet we found a smooth-floored room that meas- 
ured three hundred feet in length, twenty five 
feet in width, and thirty feet in height. The 
walls were solid white onyx lined or banded 
with pink and golden stripes. The ceiling was 
arched, and draped in fantastic shapes, and hung 
with stalactites innumerable. The room was so 
large and the drapery and festooning so delicate 
and beautiful, that we were filled with awe and 
could not speak for a time. 

"At last we started to further explore this 
wonderland. On going to the farther end of the 
room we found a passage leading on. This we 



Ozarks and Black Hills. 178 

followed for a hundred feet and found the whole 
cavern lined with onyx and crystals clear as 
glass. After loading up with specimens we re- 
traced our steps and on reaching the large rooni 
we had first entered we heard a roaring, rumb- 
ling noise. An awful noise truly, which filled 
us with an unknown dread. 

"On approaching the entrance we saw a stream 
of water pouring down, completely filling the 
hole. 

"For a moment we felt like rats caught in a 
trap, our only way of egress occupied by a 
stream of water falling straight down seventy 
feet, and then we wondered how long it would 
take to fill up the room. 

'"Suddenly the thought that there might be an 
outlet for the water gave us new hope, so we 
went to see and sure enough we found a natural 
water-course down through an opening we had 
overlooked. We gathered up courage once more, 
and thought the best thing would be something 
to occupy our time. So we set to work getting 
out more specimens and in a couple of hours the 
water stopped running and we were ourselves 
once more. 

"Ray grasped the rope, which was soaking wet, 
and went up the seventy feet, hand over hand, 
like a cat. I, being heavier, found it quite dif- 
ferent from going down. The rope played whip- 
cracker with me for some time and before reach- 



174 Cave Begiont. 

ing the top I was covered with bruises. But 
daylight never appeared so beautiful before. 

"Here we found the cause of so much water. 
A cloud-burst had occurred on the Divide and a 
large portion of it had poured down the passage 
way to the cave. 

"We found our horses patiently waiting for us 
and night closing in. Mounting we rode rapid- 
ly home, resolved never to venture into this cave 
again without leaving some one at the entrance 
to give warning in case of danger. 

"John F. Sidey." 

The first specimen taken out was given to us 
on our first visit to the ranch, and is pure white 
with a stripe of brilliant golden yellow. Hav- 
ing been invited to give a name to this new find 
it seems quite proper after reading the descrip- 
tion of the deluge and seeing the bright bands 
of color, and considering the hopeful promise of 
future possibilities, to call it The Rainbow 
Cave. 



CHAPTER XIV. 

CRYSTAL GATE. 

South Dakota can boast of yet another cave 
in the Black Hills that was formed by volcanic 
disturbance of the rocks and afterwards decora- 
ted in a manner peculiar to itself. This is Crys- 
tal Cave. It is nine miles from Piedmont in the 
eastern edge of the Hills, and easily visited from 
that point by way of the narrow-gauge road, 
which winds along the natural curves of the 
beautiful Elk Creek Canon, whose walls are said 
to expose a depth of almost a mile of geological 
strata, although the exposure at any one point 
does not exceed three hundred feet. 

The disappointment of not having seen this 
cave during the summer visit to the Hills grew 
as the weeks passed, and a request that the 
owner should send a description was answered 
with an assurance that it was impossible. 
Therefore, on Friday, November 13ch, 1896, 
with a small nephew, Herbert A. Owen, Jr., f^r 
company, the trip was undertaken a second time 
to complete the unfinished mission. 

The first glimpse of the Hills is at Edgemont 
in the early morning, but the train makes its 
way to the north through the heart of the up- 

176 



176 Cave Regions of the 

lift, twisting about the curves of the hills and 
clinging to the sides of a beautiful eaiion whose 
high walls give way here and there to fine 
slopes densely covered with forests of pine and 
spruce. These look black in the distance and 
suggested the name of Black Hills to the In- 
dians, who alvvaj's have a reason for the names 
they give even to their children. 

There are great tracts where fire has killed 
part or all of the timber but left much of it 
standing, while in other places nature has defied 
the power of fire and the hills are re-clothed 
with young trees. A recent storm had further 
beautified the region with a few inches of snow, 
but as the day advanced a chinook began to 
blow so that when Deadwood was reached, soon 
after noon, only the northern exposures retained 
an appearance of winter. 

Deadwood is a most peculiar little city and 
very attractive in its peculiarity, being crowded 
snugly into a depression between a number of 
steep pine-wooded hills, which gives an appear- 
ance suggestive of a bird's nest securely located 
among the forks of a branching tree, and as is 
the case in a nest, business is chiefly transacted 
at the lowest depth of the enclosure. As the 
busy center of a great gold-mining region, the 
metropolis of the Hills, and the outgrowth of an 
exciting historical past, it claims and receives 
interesting attention. And while the whole 



o 
o 

5 




Ozarks and Black Hills. Ill 

Black Hills region is still distinctly a man's 
country, it is called woman's paradise, and 
surely nowhere else are the daughters of Eve 
received with a more gracious courtesy or sur- 
rounded by an equally unobtrusive protecting 
care. 

The streets leading up to the residences lack 
verj^ little of standing on end, and the houses 
appear to have been hung in place by means of 
hooks and wire cord like pictures on a wall. 
The smelter has no reception day but admits 
visitors as if their pleasure were a guarantee of 
profit. 

The finest scenery in the Hills is said to be 
that of the Spearfish Canon, north of Deadwood, 
and the finest of that at the Falls, but this may 
be doubtful as other points are very beautiful, 
especially where the Burlington & Missouri 
Road requires a distance of seven miles to climb 
the canon wall. 

Piedmont being the nearest town to Crystal 
Cave, we took the early evening train on the Elk 
Horn Road and soon were located, and shocked 
to learn that the proprietor of the cave had 
started several days before to drive to Wind 
Cave for specimens. The cave was closed and 
no one there. The trip had been taken for the 
one purpose of exploring Crystal Cave, and a 
letter sent in advance to announce our coming. 



178 Cave Regions of the 

but the train carrying it was an hour late so he 
drove off without the mail. 

There seemed at first nothing to be done but 
take the next returning train, which, under the 
circumstances, was objectionable. A night's 
rest and a telegram that had to be sent twelve 
miles by special messenger, improved the situa- 
tion. The proprietor was unavoidably detained 
at Wind Cave, but secured a reliable guide, ex- 
pressed me the cave keys, and has since married 
the " specimen " he had gone in quest of. May 
great happiness dwell at the cave many years ! 

The morning of the third day after our arrival 
found arrangements all complete, and soon after 
the train left Piedmont it entered Elk Creek 
Canon, which is always beautiful, but on that 
morning was exceptionally so on account of a 
sudden change in the weather having covered 
every visible portion of the passing landscape 
with heavy frost. The trees on distant hills that 
ordinarily are black, were, for once, all softly 
white, and when the tall pines in the canon were 
shaken by a breeze, they cast a shower of flakes 
like snow. 

Here the canon walls are in Carboniferous 
Limestone with a pleasing variety of color in the 
strata, and the erosion-carving not overdone, 
the most notable piece being the Knife-blade. 
This, at first view, appears to be a high, round 
tower, but the train following the curve, reveals 




The Knife-Blade. 

Page 178. 



OzarTcs and Black Hills. 179 

the fact that it is not a tower, but a thin, curved 
knife-blade. The sun just for one instant shone 
through a rift in the clouds, and added special 
charm to the scene. 

A short distance bej'ond is Crystal Cave 
station, vrhere the guide v/as waiting to take us 
in charge. He is an intelligent young man who 
has served an enlistment term in the army, is 
recently married, very obliging, and proud of 
being trustworthy. 

The scenery here is most beautiful as well as 
grand. The canon makes a sharp turn toward 
the south, and on the north opens out into 
another canon of even greater beauty and higher 
walls, the perpendicular being three hundred 
feet in places. Crystal Cave is in the hill em- 
braced by the junction curve. The natural 
entrance is more than two hundred feet above 
the canon bed and was naturally approached 
from above. A short walk up the north canon, 
whose name has unfortunately slipped away, was 
over ice and snow the chinook had failed to 
reach, and brought us to a long stairway against 
the wall, which affords a more direct approach 
than nature gave and is a fair test of physical 
perfection. 

Finally a resting place is reached where the 
grandeur of the view can be enjoyed ; and then 
a shorter stairway completes the ascent of the 
wall, but not of the hill, so there is still a con^ 



180 Cave Regions of the 

eiderable upward walk through the forest of tall 
pines all carpeted with brilliant mats of kinni- 
kinic with its shining leaves, glowing in shades 
of green and red, trying to rival the bright scar- 
let berries. The kinnikinic here resembles the 
wintergreen of the east, while in the mountains 
in Colorado it grows in the form of a shrub two 
to three feet in height, but with no variation in 
the leaf or berr3\ 

At last perserverance is rewarded with a view 
of the cave buildings and the summit of the hill 
rising yet higher beyond, and tall, straight pines 
swaying in the rising wind over all. 

One of the two houses was entered and prep- 
arations quickly made for entering the cave, the 
artificial tunnel entrance being only a little dis- 
tance further on. 

The door was unlocked, candle-sticks taken 
from a shelf within, candles from the guide's 
supply lighted, and we went forward at last, 
into Crystal Cave. At the end of the new 
tunnel, a second door was passed through, which 
is locked on the inside during the visiting sea- 
son by the last guide to enter, in order that no 
chance late arrival may enter alone and be lost. 

The first room is u small one at the junction 
of the natural and artificial entrances, from 
which we go upstairs to the Resting Room, in 
the highest level of the cave, and perfectly dry 
but otherwise of no special interest. After a 



Ozarks and Black Hills. 181 

short rest here we went down stairs at the side 
opposite that on which we entered, into a pas- 
sage leading to the cave's first beauty, the Red 
Room. As the name indicates, the walls are 
vividly colored and represent the uncertain line 
which separates the Carhoniferous strata from 
the Triassic rocks. The color is handsomely 
brought out here in contrast with masses of 
calcite crystal, so as to present by the combina- 
tion a charmingly beautiful room, from which 
we retired, feet first, down a " squeeze " to the 
Bridal Chamber, where we found ourselves 
perched on an irregular narrow ledge, high 
up on the wall, and cherishing a private convic- 
tion that exploration had met a checkmate ; but 
the guide reached the floor and my nephew, 
Herbert, scrambled down with as much ease as 
the chipmunk he had chased to the house top a 
while before ; so a little application settled the 
difficulty and re-united the party. The room is 
an artistic study in red, and the only reason for 
its being called the Bridal Chamber is that the 
way out is decidedly more rough and difficult 
than that by which the entrance is effected; this, 
however, is an observation not based on official 
information. 

Off to one side of this room is Lost Man's 
Paradise, also in red and crystal, named in 
honor of the timely rescue of one who had faced 
the possibility of becoming a lost soul. 



182 Cave Regions of the 

Another Fat Man's Miseiy, on a lower level, 
leads from the Bridal Chamber to the Biy Dome, 
a large room with a fme dome-shaped ceiling 
from which heavy masses of crystals have fallen 
to the floor ; and down a steep incline from here 
is Eeef Rock, an immense fallen rock with box 
work on the under side, which at one time 
served to ornament the ceiling; and now this 
rock marks the beginning of Poverty Flat, a 
broad, low passage of great extent, that has 
been robbed of all its wonderful treasure of 
crystal and ends in a steep, rough declivity 
named Bunker Hill by the guides who dreaded 
to mount it when going out loaded with speci- 
mens. At the foot of the Hill is a bowlder of 
enormous size and with a pointed top, known as 
Pyramid Rock and giving the same name to the 
large room in which it stands. 

Every portion of Crystal Cave has at one time 
been heavily crusted with calcite crystals, 
mainly of the dog-tooth variety, and any barren 
places are so either because the surface has been 
removed for specimens, or thrown down by the 
violence of an earthquake. But where the 
latter has been the cause of removal, the crystals 
have in most cases been renewed, which is 
amply evidenced by the fallen masses being 
crystallized on all sides; and these as well as 
most of the walls, are not covered thinly with 
one crust, but layer has been added to layer 



Ozarka and Black HilU. 188 

until the thickness is four to ten inches and 
often more. The ceilings that have been 
denuded by nature's forces during the same 
early period when water filled the cave were 
also renewed. 

From the Pyramid Room a narrow fissure 
forms a passage to the Cactus Chamber, where 
there is a marvelous floor on which the crystals 
are in bunches like cacti, and the beautiful 
ceiling is the finest and most irregular unbroken 
mass of crystal yet seen. 

Passing through a round hole known as the 
Needle's Eye, we enter Statuary Hall, where 
the latest inrush of water has eroded the sharp 
points from the crystals, leaving only smooth 
surfaces, and at the same time done much cu- 
rious carving, the most conspicuous pieces of 
this work being a bear and the heads of an 
Indian and his baby. 

Out from the Hall are two important routes, 
one down the steep incline of Beaver's Slide to 
The Catacombs, and another, which we followed 
first, is through Rocky Run, a rough and rocky 
pass, to a large and handsomely crystallized 
chamber called the I. X. L. Room, on account of 
those three letters, over twelve inches in height, 
being distinctly and conspicuously worked in 
crystal on a magnificent piece of box work that 
would weigh nearly half a ton, for which an offer 
of five hundred dollars is said to have been refused. 



134 Gave Regio7is of the 

The next chamber beyond is Tilotson Hall, 
very large and extremely rough, and named in 
honor of a teacher from the Normal School, who 
delivered an address here that gave much pleas- 
ure to both visitors and guides. 

The way to farther advance is now more 
diflScult and through a jagged crevice of threat- 
ening appearance, but the trip is made in safety 
and with comparative ease, and brings us into 
Notre Dame, one of the largest chambers in the 
cave and perhaps the finest, although where 
so much is fine that may be uncertain. The 
display of box work and crystal is sufficiently 
gorgeous to do honor to the famous old cathe- 
dral of France, the ceiling especially being a 
masterpiece of the builder's and decorator's 
arts; but the grandest portion, which a visitor 
recently returned from foreign travel called The 
Russian Castle, on account of the magnificence 
of the large box work and pearly crystal masses, 
should rather be known as the great cathedral's 
crowning glory. The Altar. 

Another large room, the handsome Council 
Chamber, is entered just as that Altar of pearl 
is lost to view ; and from there an up-hill trip is 
taken through a narrow crevice to Whale Flat, 
which is the natural history room, with a large 
whale as the show specimen. 

Going out from here we enter another crevice 
which serves as a steep stairway descending to 



■■.•''.;rvi 




The Bridal Veil. 
Page 187. 



Ozarks and Black Hills. 185 

a lower level, and measures from top to bottom 
one hundred and eighteen feet. This is called 
Rip Van Winkle's Stairway, and although mere- 
ly a high and crooked crack in the rock, is very 
beautiful because heavily coated with crystal, 
the effect being especially striking at the top 
where the crystal is partly worn away and leaves 
exposed patches of red rock. 

At the foot of the Stairway is the first room 
containing water, and is called the Gypsy Camp. 
It is the most charming chamber yet visited, 
with not the smallest spot of plain or common 
rock visible. The ceiling, walls, floor, and 
groups of fallen rocks, are all unbroken masses 
of pearly calcite in crystals of varied sizes, with 
here and there a patch coated over with pure 
white carbonate of lime, or supporting a bunch 
of fragile egg-shell, which is a thin, hollow 
crust of lime carbonate, almost invariably having 
the pointed form of the dog-tooth spar. And 
there are also beautiful mats and banks of dainty 
white carbonate flowers. While waiting here 
for the guide to go in quest of the lunch we had 
carelessly left behind, the time was utilized in 
measuring the room, which is a small one. 
The size of the cave and our limited time for 
seeing it, prevented much-desired measurements 
from being taken in all parts of the cave. 

This room was found to be forty-eight feet 
long, the irregular width varied from fourteen 



186 Cave Regions of the 

to thirty feet and the height from four and one- 
half to ten feet. The crystal water basin is 
especially beautiful and the water so clear that 
we stood looking into it with disappointment, 
being thirsty and thinking it dry, until the 
guide laughingly dipped and offered a cupful. 
The basin is the segment of a circle rounding 
beneath a massive, overhanging crystal ledge of 
wonderful beauty, and is nine feet long by two 
in width. This room and the Stairway into it 
are alone worthy of a visit, but there is much 
that is finer still. 

Out of Gypsy Camp by way of Gunny Sack 
Crawl, so named by the workmen who spread 
gunny sacks to relieve the torture of crawling 
over the beautiful floor of sharp crystals, we 
enter the first chamber, where active operation 
is still maintained and certain branches of the 
great decorative industry of the cave may be 
carefully studied. This operative chamber, 
which is unnamed, would no doubt be called a 
factory in the east, but in its ow^n locality 
would more likely be referred to as The Works. 

The next chamber entered is Crystal Flat, 
whose floor is completely covered with immense 
crystal blocks, and the wonderful crystal ceiling 
is exceedingly fine. But time being limited we 
must pass on into the Lake Room, where is Crys- 
tal Lake, the largest body of water in the cave. 
It is about thirty feet long by fifteen wide and 



Ozarks and Black Hills. 187 

its greatest depth is said to be ten feet. The 
water is cold and clear, and the gold fish intro- 
duced as an experiment three years ago are 
said to have grown rapidly but not yet turned 
white, and are not known to have become 
blind. 

At some little distance from Crystal Lake, 
and not within the same range of vision, 
although in the same room, is Dry Lake, which 
to the surprise of the guide we found to be not 
dry, but full of limpid water through which we 
could distinctly see the delicate clusters of crys- 
tals it is depositing. They are of a pale honey 
yellow and are called Gum-drops on account of 
the resemblance to that variety of confection. 

The name Dry Lake was given because in 
blasting out a passage a misdirected shot went 
through the bottom of the Lake, which in con- 
sequence was soon drained; but the heavily 
charged water has sealed up the unfortunate 
break, and resumed its interrupted work. The 
ceiling drops to a height of little more than 
three feet directly above the Lake margin, and is 
a beautiful crystal mass, which at a little dis- 
tance down the sloping floor appears as the 
background for a fine piece of cave statuary 
called The Bridal Veil, and formed of cream- 
tinted dripstone. Not a great deal of imagina- 
tion is required to see a slender girlish figure 
completely enveloped in the flowing folds of a 



188 Cave Regions of the 

wedding veil that falls lightly about her feet. 
The figure itself is three feet ten inches in height 
and stands on an almost flat circular base of tlie 
same material, that measures nine inches in 
depth and two feet eight inches in diameter. 
At times the water rises sufficiently to cover 
the base, in proof of which it left a fringe-like 
border of small sharp crystals, such as could be 
formed only beneath the water%.; surface. Most 
of this border has, unfortunately, been chiseled 
oft" for specimens, but will be renewed in time 
if left undisturbed; and that condition can 
easily be secured with a few feet of wire 
netting. 

To one side of this room is a most daintilj^ 
beautiful alcove so profusely decorated with 
fragile forms of dripstone that a passage 
through it without causing damage is extremely 
difficult. This alcove is about twenty-five feet 
in either direction, with a sloping floor almost 
covered with stalagmi tic growths above the earlier 
deposit of sharp crystals, and many of these 
rise in slender columns to the glass-like ceiling, 
which varies in height from three to six feet and 
is thickly studded with small stalactites of both 
varieties — the pointed, solid form, and those of 
uniform size, which are always hollow like a 
pipe stem. The central ornament is the Chimes, 
a musical group of stalactites which is scarcely 
more beautiful than Cleopatra's Needle, at u 




The Chimes. 

Page 188. 




The Needle. 

Page 188. 



Ozarks and Black Hills. 189 

distance of a few feet to one side, a transparent 
column four feet in height and having an aver- 
age circumference of seventeen inches. 

The Abode of the Fairies is a similar, though 
smaller room, with The Tower of Babel for a 
handsome show-piece. While this portion of 
the cave is extremely attractive, the measure- 
ments given show that in comparison with caves 
of other states the drip deposit here is too small 
to be reckoned an important feature in itself, 
but in conjunction with the miles of calc-spar 
that give the cave a character distinctly its own, 
it well repays all attention. 

Leaving Lake Room we enter a newly opened, 
long, dry passage to Slab Room, where a com- 
paratively recent earthquake has shaken down 
the ornamental ceiling and spread it in great 
slabs over the floor; and having since remained 
perfectly dry it has the appearance of being the 
work of yesterday. This room is remembered 
as the one in which a party of workers were 
lost, and one of their number gave a severe n-er- 
vous shock to the junior proprietor by suggest- 
ing that as he was acting as guide and unable to 
lead them out, it was only right that he should 
be the first victim to satisfy their hunger. A 
rescuing party with extinguished candles was 
listening behind a rock to the blood-curdling 
speech, and came forv/ard to restore cheerfulness. 

A long, irregular, frosty looking crevice called 



190 Cave Reyions of the 

Jack Frost Streak, conducts us from Slab Room 
and ends at Mold Ladder, on which we pause to 
admire a wonderful growth of snow-white cave 
vegetation, before ascending into Santa Claus' 
Pass, the longest passage in the cave. It is a 
rough crevice named from the fact of being dis- 
covered on Christmas Eve, and ends at the 
Government Room on the main tourist route 
where a U. S. pack saddle and apparently port- 
able bath tub are conspicuous. 

Next beyond is a very large room named New 
Zealand, on account or its icy appearance and 
the undisputed possession of a seal. This room 
in turn opens into Mold Chamber, where an old 
board platform, formerly used for the display 
of specimens, has fostered the most marvelously 
beautiful growth of mold: it hangs in ropes five 
and six feet long, with tasseled ends, and in 
broad, looped draperies; but is most beautiful 
where it has taken possession of the rocks and 
spreads out on the flat surface like large open 
fans, with deep, soft feather borders. 

Having been in the cave eight hours, we now 
followed the outward passage from Mold Cham- 
ber and soon reached an open trap door where the 
guide suggested to Herbert that he would be 
afraid to go down alone and allow him to close 
the door; but the child surprised him by quietly 
stepping down and then asking why he wished 



Ozarks and Black Sills. 191 

it, only to be told " because we are coming too." 
Which we did and found ourselves in the main 
entrance passage, and in due time returned to 
the outer world where a terrific wind was roar- 
ing through the tall pines and the early winter 
evening had already closed in dark. 

The guide locked the cave, walked with us to 
the house where he lighted a lamp and left us to 
prepare for the return to town ; but the lamp, 
belonging to a bachelor, was empty, so we made 
our preparations in imitation of the blind. On 
the guide's return he lighted a candle, but sug- 
gested that twenty minutes were generally 
allowed for reaching the station. 

The house was accordingly closed and as we 
walked down the long, curving slope to the 
stairway, he told of a new and unknown bob- 
tailed wolf that has recently made its first 
appearance among the hills in considerable 
numbers and to the terror of stock. It attacks 
and bites horses or cattle, and after waiting for 
the fatal poison inflicted to take effect, falls to 
and eats the victim. 

The uncovered platform which serves as a 
station being reached a few minutes before the 
train arrived, I expressed an unwillingness 
to detain our guide longer on account of his 
having a walk of four and a half miles to his 
home; but he declined to consider the subject; 



192 Cave Regions. 

saying he had been directed not to leave us until 
we were taken safely on the train, which came 
sweeping round the curve on time and stopped 
for us. 



w^^^^^ 


Ulill 


ioBhHB 


m f^^ 


■ 




1 1 




^Rv*? . . .^^B 




w 




^^!^I^^^S 


"^^s^g^^mo^^ 


^H 



Tower of Babel. 

Page 189. 



CHAPTER XV. 

CRYSTAL CAVE CONCLUDED. 

According to agreement the guide again met 
us at the station on the following morning, for 
another day in the cave, which we entered with 
no unnecessary loss of time, and hurrying 
through the main entrance passage, Government 
Room and Statuary Hall, went down Beaver Slide, 
which, on the previous day, we had passed to enter 
Rocky Run. Our descent into the crevice took 
us past those portions known as Suspension 
Bridge and Rebecca's Well, and over some very 
" rough country " to the most wonderful parts 
of the cave. Numerous passages open out in 
various directions; one to rooms of frost work 
of great beauty ; another to the Ribbon Room 
where the drip deposits on the walls are in rib- 
bon-like stripes of red, yellow, and white, while 
others yet are ways to the Catacomba. 
And it is the Catacombs we particularly 
wish to see, as they most perfectly repre- 
sent the individual character of the cave 
and have, as yet, received no injury from either 
time or man ; but is a region as difficult to travel 
as the way of the transgressor, and many miles 

193 



194 Cave Regions of the 

can be traversed with no prospect of coming to 
the end. But where locomotion is so slow and 
painful, the owner of a pedometer would find 
that instrument a discouraging companion and 
soon learn better than to consult its record pub- 
licly. 

The Catacombs are a series of connected fis- 
sures and small crevices in which every inch 
of exposed surface is covered with clear, trans- 
lucent, almost transparent, calcite crystals, 
neither coated with lime nor stained with clay ; 
nor even is the pearly lustre dimmed with the 
slightest trace of dust. The crystals are very 
sharp and of all sizes, ranging from half an inch 
to three and a half inches in length, the larger 
sizes being conspicuously abundant. The en- 
tire region is an enormously large, perfectly 
formed, and undamaged geode. In reality, the 
whole cave is a great cluster of connected ge- 
odes, and a similar work probably does not ex- 
ist, but if it does, has never been discovered. 
The fissures from which it is formed were 
opened by volcanic violence and then enlarged, 
and afterwards decorated by the varied power 
of water, in action or repose. 

When the storms toward the close of the Ter- 
tiary period suddenly overwhelmed with floods 
the dense growth of tropical vegetation and 
multitudinous animal life in the Northwest, 
the waters necessarily became heavily charged 



Ozarhs and Black Hills, 195 

with the naturally resulting carbonic acid gas, 
and this, acting on the limestone rooks, would 
decompose them, leaving a residual clay and 
taking the chief portions of the mineral com- 
ponents in solution, to be afterwards deposited 
according to circumstances and conditions; and 
these are indicated by the various results found 
in Wind Cave, Crystal Cave, the Onyx Caves and 
the Bad Lands. The latter being previous to that 
time by no means"bad," but richly luxuriant in 
tropical vegetation, which gave shelter from the 
heat to great numbers of curious animals. 

Some approximate idea of the extreme age of 
these caves may be gained from the fact that 
bones of a three-toed horse have been discov- 
ered in a chamber of Crystal Cave that must 
be practically unchanged since the remains were 
carried in from the outside, as otherwise they 
would have been buried beneath the fallen 
masses of crystal covered rock with which the 
entire floor is cumbered. And yet this room is 
so remote from any present connection with the 
outer world that it is impossible for their intro- 
duction to have taken place in recent times. 

In the beautiful Catacombs progress is as 
slow as in a cactus thicket or a blackberry patch. 
The crevices lack none of the usual crevice ir- 
regularities; high places must be mounted or 
descended, chasms crossed and narrow pas- 
sages crawled through, while «xtra caution 



106 Cave Regions of the 

must be exercised to avoid striking the head or 
making a misstep that might result in a fall. 
The hands are in constant use and soon become 
so sensitive that holding a soft handkerchief 
gives infinite relief; but the worst experience is 
the " crawls" where only the sties of the feet, 
being temporarily turned up, seem safe from the 
savage treatment of the sharp calcite dog-teeth. 
The worst crawl encountered was a small one 
having a downward slope with a jump-ofFat the 
end which necessitated its being taken feet first. 
Fortunately it was short. But in no place do 
the difficulties outweigh the pleasure of behold- 
ing scenes of such beauty, or suggest regret for 
the time, torn garments, and personal exertion 
required for its enjoyment. 

In many portions of the cave the surface 
layer of crystals has had the points worn away 
by the action of water, later than that in which 
•they were formed; but in the Catacombs and 
other extensive regions as well, the finished 
work of crystallization is preserved in an abso- 
lutely perfect condition. And everywhere the 
largest crystals are on the under side of a pro- 
jection or the roof of a cavitj''. 

As the day was passing far too rapidly and 
many points of special interest yet remained 
unseen, we turned with reluctance from the 
beauty and relief from the hardships of explo- 
ration in the Catacombs, and made our way 



Ozarks and Black Hills. 197 

over a crevice into Santa Claus' Pass, which was 
traversed for a considerable distance and then 
abandoned for a low crawl terminating at the Sen- 
ate Chamber, This is a large room extending 
to Poverty Flat, and is brilliantly red and 
purely white, most of the crystal presenting a 
smooth surface. Under the Senate Chamber 
there is said to be some fine box work which we 
had no time to visit. The name of this chamber 
was given by a visiting party composed of 
members of both houses of Congress. A smaller 
room, which is really an extension of the Senate 
Chamber, has handsome walls of white and red 
box work on account of which the same dis- 
tinguished party called it the Senate Post-offlee. 

From here a difficult crawl, through red rock, 
well-worn by the action of water, leads to the 
Starr Chamber, another large room in white and 
red, and named by Senator Starr of South Da- 
kota. 

Opening out from the last room is a curious, 
dangerous looking, narrow, crevice-chamber 
known as Suicide Room on account of the threat- 
ening appearance of over-hanging rocks, some 
of which have at times fallen in great masses 
of various sizes to form an irregular floor; and 
a descent of this is necessary in order to reach 
a short and extremely rough crawl, beautifully 
and painfully decorated with sharp crystals 
above and below and on the sides. From this 



198 Cave Regions of the 

we emerge into Rainy Chamber, an elliptical 
room not less than two hundred feet long by- 
one hundred feet wide, with a tent-like ceiling 
rising high in the center and sloping down to 
meet the floor, which also slopes irregularly 
toward a deep central depression, giving the 
room a greater height than any other visited. 
The high points are generally seen in the nar- 
row crevices, while the rooms of generous 
length and breadth are usually low, many of 
the largest having an average of five feet or 
even less. 

Although there is frequent intersection of 
crevices, and each chamber has passages leading 
out on every side, the general direction of the 
cave is said to be northwest-southeast. 

Rainy Chamber is named from the fact that 
during the early months of summer water falls 
constantly in the form of a light shower; but it 
drips at all times, and in consequence there is an 
opportunity to study the active process of form- 
ation of one of the deposits which is very 
abundant in Wind Cave and considered the 
most perplexing. This is the pop-corn, and the 
theories of its origin have been steadily rejected 
at Wind Cave because of a doubt being enter- 
tained as to whether it has been deposited under 
water or by drippings. Herein Rainy Chamber 
it is fully explained. Near the center of the 
room the fallen masses are heavily crystallized. 



Ozarks and Black Hills. 199 

much of the groundwork being fine box work 
and the crystals in perfect condition. On these 
crystals tlie pop-corn is being formed, and 
specimens can be seen in all stages of develop- 
ment, from the beginning to an approximate 
degree of finish; and whatever the position it 
occupies on the receiving surface, either on top, 
un<lerneath, or on a side exposure, it alwaj-s 
maintains the same relative position as growing 
plants on the mundane sphere. The water fall- 
ing on the upper surface in scattering drops 
forms myriads of minute stalagmites; on eide 
positions the falling drop first strikes the point 
exposed to its line of descent and then spreads. 
The scant moisture slowly makes its way down 
sloping sides and shelving edges, leaving on each 
small irregularity a tiny portion of its volume, 
to deposit an infinitely small charge of solid 
substance, and the balance finally hangs in 
moisture less than drops on the growing grains 
of the under surface. 

Pop-corn, therefore, is the globular aragonite 
of the stalagmitic variety. A small specimen 
from Rainy Chamber, placed beside one of 
the same color from Wind Cave, shows them to 
be absolutely alike. 

Rainy Chamber is the room in which the bones 
of the three-toed horse, already referred to, 
were found, but their presence has not yet been 
explained ; therefore the case is open to con- 



200 Cave Regions of the 

jecture and several theories may be advanced 
and their values considered. The first question 
when such a discovery is made, is whether tiie 
living animal was possibly a cave-dweller; which, 
as the horse was not, is quickly disposed of and 
attention turned to the next, the possibility of a 
carniverous animal having carried his prey into 
the dark recesses of the cave in order that the 
enjoyment of his dinner might be undisturbed. 
This theory is equally unavailable by reason of 
the topographical features presented. If the 
present natural entrance to the cave were the 
only way into this room from the outside, the 
distance was too great and beset with many 
difficulties; besides which the final passage is 
too small to admit an animal of sufficient size to 
carry any considerable portion of even a very small 
horse. But if at that period the room had 
direct communication with the outside through 
an opening since closed, the shape of the walls 
indicate that it must have been a pot-hole in the 
roof, and through this an animal could have 
entered by falling, which the horse and others 
may have done. .But it seems most probable 
that the remains were carried in by the water 
through such a hole before it was closed at the 
beginning of the Quaternary period, when tlie 
erosion of the Hills was most active. 

Rainy Chamber also contains ;i large anil 



Ozarks and Black Hilts. 201 

beautiful assortment of the small polished and 
coated jpebbles called cave pearls. 

The guide being anxious that we should not 
fail to see the Niagara Roora, we now turned 
toward a low, broad opening in the wall, a short 
distance to the right of the entrance, where the 
rising floor and descending ceiling, failing to 
meet, had overlapped; so we made our way up a 
steep, smooth bank, and then down on the other 
side over a broken, rocky surface for a distance 
of about twenty feet, when the roof at last joined 
the floor and two small water-worn holes at the 
point of junction revealed an untempting pass- 
age within. The broader of these holes was 
three feet, but too low to be considered an 
entrance; the other was round but certainly not 
so large as our guide, w^ho was preparing to enter 
it with doubts of his ability to make the trip, on 
account of having increased in size since his one 
entrance there, on which occasion two smaller 
guides pulled him through the tightest places. 
Carefully comparing his size with that of the 
hole he sat beside, there was no possibility of 
doubt that if the attempt were made he would 
stick fast, and that would place our little party 
in dire straits. Consequently I insisted that it 
should not be, but he was unwilling that Niagara 
should be missed when so near. Finally I posi- 
tively refused to go unless he would consent to 
give us instructions and remain where he was 



202 Gave Regions of the 

while we went without him, to which he at last 
yielded with extreme unwillingness. He had 
frequently shown us the guide's marks, and now 
earnestly cautiorjed me to advance only ns they 
point, and turn back if they should fail. 

The small nephew went on a reconnoiteriug 
expedition to the end of the passage, and 
reported that the jump-ofF there was higher than 
himself but he could get down. 1 now crawled 
through the hole and found the passage to be a 
"crawl " or rather a " sprawl," from fifteen to 
eighteen inches high, but having an ample width 
varying from three to six feet. The smooth, 
straight floor has a steep downward inclination 
and is thickly covered with dust. 

Having reached the widest portion, which is 
rear the end, Herbert directed me to turn, so as 
to come down the jump-off feet first, where 
there was a little difficulty in landing, as the 
perpendicular wall, which proved to be almost 
five feet high, offered only one projecting 
help, and that within a few inches of the 
base; but in obedifnce to his advice to "reach 
one foot a little farther down and then drop," 
I advanced the right one, to be told not that, 
but the other, and was soon down where it M'as 
possible to observe with interest that the right 
foot had been swinging above an open fissure. 
We stood in a wide crevice running at right 
angles to the obnoxious passage we had just 



Ozarks and Black Hills. 263 

quit, and immediately found a guide's mark on 
a large rock, and others followed at intervals of 
a few feet over extremely '-rough country" as 
the guides say. Everywhere the work of water 
was apparent, not in the crystal deposits of 
still water as in other portions of the cave, but 
the erosion due to its rushing through. Care- 
fully following the marks, they led into a 
cross-crevice that took us under Rainy Chamber, 
and ends there by widening into a circular 
chamber of about fifty feet width in either 
direction, and rising to a height of nearly fifty 
feet in a fine dome. Down the wall from near 
the top of the dome there appears to flow a 
beautiful waterfall showing a variety of colors 
in the straight lines, as if from refraction. The 
fall is, of course, dripstone, and I knew we had 
found Niagara, although we had gone beyond 
the reach of the guide's voice almost at the 
start. A huge rock directly under the dome 
has received the falling drip until it represents 
a mountain cataract. These deposits testify to 
the great age of the chamber they adorn, as they 
were necessarily not commenced until all heavy 
flow ceased, and in Crystal Cave the accumula- 
tion of dripstone is so slow that it is said six 
years' observation can detect no increase what- 
ever. 

Several small passages at the floor level gave 
exit to the great volume of water that evidently 



204 Cave Regions of the 

at one time entered this crevice, from Rainy 
Chamber, by the route we followed, and being 
checked in its course the lower end of the crevice 
became filled, under pressure; and the low 
position of the outlets gave this water a whirling 
motion that in time excavated the dome-shaped 
room. 

No part of Crystal Cave has ever been occupied 
by a river, but its fissures, opened by the viol- 
ence of earth movements accompanying nearby 
volcanic disturbances, have been filled more than 
once by the inrush of waters which repeatedly 
submerged the whole Black Hills region. 

Following again the marks which guided us 
into Niagara Room, we soon came within hailing 
distance of a voice expressive of profound relief; 
and as we crawled up the sloping passage, 
over-heated and breathless with the exertion, 
the guide assured us he was most truly thankful 
to see us again, as he had never in his life ex- 
perienced so severe a scare as since it had 
occurred to him that we had gone bej'ond the 
limits of communication without a single match. 

He also said I had been where no lady had 
ever gone before, and took satisfaction in the 
fact that many men have refused to make the 
venture with a guide. 

Leaving this portion of the cave, b}' returning 
as we came, through Suicide Room, Starr 
Chamber, and Senate Chamber, we crawled 



Ozarks and Black Hills. 205 

along the rocks overhanging a narrow fissure, to 
reach a ladder at the end, by which we descended 
to another part of the Catacombs. Here, after 
traveling a long distance over uneven floors 
covered with sharp crystals, as were all surfaces, 
through large, low rooms, and narrow, crooked 
passages, constantly assisting the difficult ad- 
vance with our hands, like monkeys, we finally 
came to The Grotto, which is probably the most 
remarkable room in this very remarkable cave. 
It is a large room, with much of the irregular 
ceiling so low that even the small nephew struck 
his head severely while turning to warn me, as 
he often did, of threatening inequalities in the 
floor and light them with his own candle. The 
crystals here are exceptionally fine, being very 
sharp and of unusual size, besides many of them 
being double — that is, pointed at both ends. 
Through this beautiful ceiling there is a per- 
colating drip adding stalactites to the crystal- 
points and piling stalagmites on the crystal masses 
below, varying this with imitation cascades, 
mats of small flowers, and masses of pop-corn. 
Off to one side in a kind of recess there is a 
depression in the crystal floor filled with clear, 
cold water. 

A glance at the time now showed us to be in 
danger of failure to meet the train to town, and 
consequently, tired as we were after nine hours 
of rough travel and much climbing, it was 



206 Cave Regions of the 

necessary to make our way out with more speed 
than comfort, and we found the weather turning 
very cold. The cave was carefully locked, 
preparations for the train hurriedly made, the 
house closed, and as we left it the train could be 
heard coming down the caiion, but we arrived 
at the station first, though breathlesss, and a few 
minutes later were in Piedmont, too tired to 
properly enjoy a hot venison supper. 

As to the size of Crystal Cave, it is impossible 
to make any positive statement; for as Mr. 
McBride, the proprietor, says, no survey has 
yet been made. Other persons said that thirty- 
six miles is the greatest claim made for the 
combined length of all passsages, and sixteen 
miles the least, so it may be wise to accept the 
lesser number until a survey proves it wrong. 

The box work in Crystal Cave is not of such 
great abundance as to demand special attention, 
but is very beautiful, and one variety deserves 
particular mention. These boxes have been 
formed in dark red sandstone, and after being 
emptied of their original contents, have been 
completely filled with colorless calcite crystals, 
and over this is spread an outer surface of the 
same crystals tinted a brilliant flame color by 
red paint-clay having been taken in solution by 
the crystal forming waters. A specimen of this 
was a temptation too great to be resisted even in 
the owner's absence. 



Ozarks and Black Hills. 207 

Some of the box work is of such size that a 
single box may have a capacity equal to that 
of a bushel measure, but it is less beautiful than 
the smaller forms. 

On the following morning we left Piedmont, 
and having a desire for greater personal knowl- 
edge of the Hills, took the same train which had 
taken us to the cave, and traveled to its western 
terminus, Lead City. The interesting scenery 
makes this a desirable trip for any one visiting 
the Hills, but its beauty is chiefly massed at the 
ends, the middle distance being over gradually 
rising ground, which is without a counterpart 
of the rocky canon left behind or more than a 
suggestion of the high hills yet to come. The 
special charm of this portion was the magnificent 
pine forest which covered it until three years 
ago, when it was swept by a terrible fire, from 
which the settlers escaped with only their lives ; 
and even that would have been impossible if the 
railroad company had not kept refuge trains 
waiting for them just ahead of the flames. The 
prominent geological feature here is the por- 
phyry dikes, which are becoming more numerous 
and more prominent, and in many places resem- 
ble a conspicuous group near Harney Peak, 
called The Needles. These dykes are of special 
interest in connection with a study of the caves, 
since they are probably of simultaneous origin. 

The same volcanic movements that caused the 



208 Cave Regions of the 

violent upheaval of the whole region, and thrust 
up molten masses through the strata to form a 
central core to the Hills, must also have rent 
the nearby regions with fissures through which 
probably much gas escaped, and having been 
further opened and then adorned, now demand 
our attention as caves of unique and curious 
beauty. 

The approach to Lead is over the hill-tops 
with a magnificent distant view, and the first 
glimpses of that young city famous for having 
as a center the Homestake mine, the largest gold 
mine in the world, are charming. It is situated 
far down in a valley among the high hills and 
spreads some distance up the surrounding 
slopes. 

The works of the great mine are wonderful, 
and visitors welcome to examine whatever they 
find interesting; any questions they wish to ask 
are graciously answered, although every one is 
busy. This is not a special favor to the excep- 
tional few, but the courtesy shown to all. Visi- 
tors are also welcome to descend into the mine, 
but as an attendant is necessary on account of 
dangers to be avoided, a permit must be obtained 
at the office. 

Several other caves have been discovered in 
the Black Hills, the largest of which is the 
Davenport Cave at Sturgis. Very little explo- 
ration has yet been done in it, but indications 



OzarJcs and Black Hills. 209 

are said to be that it will take rank among the 
large ones. 

At Galena, a new mining town of golden prom- 
ise, there is reported to be an Ice Cave, where ice 
forms at all seasons, and during the warm 
weather is a source of comfort and pleasure to 
the miners. 

In the evening, as train time for continuing 
the homeward journey approached, the snow 
storm which began gently early in the afternoon, 
grew steadily more severe. A carriage to the 
depot was not to be had, as every vehicle in 
town had gone to the funeral of an old-timer in 
the Hills and the return delayed by the storm. 
The situation could not be regarded as a special 
pleasure, but cave hunters learn to accept what- 
ever is and be thankful for the general average. 
At the last moment, however, a team was driven 
up and permission given us to make use of it. 
It proved to be the private conveyance of the 
hotel proprietor, and the young boy who accom- 
panied us, his son. 

Our train was on time, and the ride through 
the Hills to their southern limit, in the falling 
snow, was wonderfully beautiful ; but the storm 
continued for many days and was one of the 
most severe on record. 

Those persons who have been so unfortunate 
as to permit themsehes to accept a ready made 
opinion of dangers and roughness to be met 



210 Cave Regions. 

with in the more newly settled regions, might 
find a tour of the Hills doubly interesting by 
making a supplementary study of "The Living 
Age," which cannot be so correctly viewed from 
a distance as is. sometimes supposed, since the 
specimens exhibited are not always a true aver- 
age of the strata they are supposed to represent. 



CHAPTER XVI. 

CONCLUSION. 

After a visit to the marvelous caverns of the 
Black Hills, much may be added to the pleasure 
already enjoyed, through the explanatory activ- 
ity of the Yellowstone National Park, where 
even the wonderful combinations of beauty and 
grandeur are by no means the full measure of 
attraction and charm. Here is found evidence 
to verify theories concerning the caves, and 
those theories in turn contribute in no small 
degree to a satisfactory understanding of the 
mysteries of geyser action. For scientific study 
the two regions should be taken together, since 
the natural conditions are practically the same, 
and the chief difference lies in the stages of 
development ; the present of the Park explaining 
the recent past of the Hills, while the present of 
the Hills foretells the future of the Park. It 
seems that Nature, with a full appreciation of 
the limits and restrictions binding our powers 
to penetrate certain secrets of an intermittent 
force, has in this great western country care- 
fully prepared what might quite properly be 
termed a progressive course of study, wherein 



212 Cave Regions of the 

each locality makes plain a special point that 
somewhere else appears obscure. 

As has been said in the preceding chapters, 
the two great caves in the Black Hills of South 
Dakota cannot be accounted for by the same 
methods as are recognized as being responsible 
for the slow excavation of the best known caves 
of the United States. Although there is every 
indication that both these caves have been sub- 
ject to the action of enormous volumes of water, 
there is equally positive evidence that neither 
was ever the scene of a flowing cave-river. 
The lowest levels in both show the narrowest 
fissures and the heaviest deposits of crystal, by 
which we infer that the water was held in con- 
finement here, while all the higher passages or 
channels bear witness to the water's flow. But 
many of these channels in Crystal Cave, or 
indeed' we might say, most of them, present an 
unmistakable record of the gauge of the water 
stage at different periods. During the earlier 
time, when the volume of water and consequent 
pressure were greatest, frictional motion must 
have been limited to the main channel connect- 
ing with the vent, and the high gauge of water 
maintained a fairly uniform degree of heat near 
its surface. In consequence of these conditions 
geyser action, probably, was constant, and chem- 
ical activity was such that great chambers were 
fornied and then decorated, as already described, 



Ozarks and Black Sills. 2lS 

with wonderful masses of crystal. As the water 
gauge receded to lower levels the higher 
chambers became storage basins for water and 
steam forced up by the pressure from below, and 
the time required for these to fill and accumulate 
sufiicient pressure to continue the ejectment, 
formed the periods between eruptions after the 
geyser became intermittent. It was during this 
stage that the sharp crystals in many of the chan- 
nels, now called passages, were worn down to 
smooth surfaces; and later, when water occupied 
only the lowest level, and the great geyser had 
become reduced to merely a steam vent, the 
channels immediately connecting with that level 
were in their turn subjected to the same smooth- 
ing process, and then all action ceased. 

As no two of the glorious geysers of the 
Yellowstone Park are alike, neither do the two 
great caves of the Hills indicate that they should 
be so. The vent-tubing of each is quite unlike 
that of the other in all the essential governing 
points oE length, size, shape, angle of inclination 
and power- conserving bends. And the differ- 
ences extend in an almost equally marked 
degree throughout the vast and complicated suc- 
cession of storage chambers and their connect- 
ing channels. The small vent of "Wind Cave 
shows that the ejected jet was far from being 
equal to that of the Crystal Cave in volume ; 
but the nearly perpendicular long arm of its 



214 Cave Regions of the 

tube shows also that its jet attained a much 
greater heiglit, even supposing that it should be 
necessary to make some allowance for a short 
elbow at the top. 

Dr. Hay den's geological party gave much 
attention to the Yellowstone Park while its won- 
ders were new to the world, and observations 
were made at various times during the period 
included between the years 1869 and 1870. The 
special study, and full report of the geysers 
became the duty of Dr. A. C. Peal, whose 
descriptions and conclusions were published in 
U. S. Geological Survey Report, 1878, Part II. 
In the final pages of his report he quotes the 
leading authorities on geyser action, and applies 
the principles of their theories, according to 
his own judgment, to the geysers of the park. 
Since copies of this report are not now easily 
obtained, nor even alwa3's accessible to the 
increasing number of personages who visit the 
park, it may be well to quote from him some of 
the theories he discussed and the opinions 
he expressed. On page 416, beginning the chap- 
ter with the derivation of the word geyser from 
the Icelandic word yeysa — to gush, he continues : 

" We now come to the definition of a geyser. 
It may be defined to be u periodically eruptive 
or intermittent hot spring, from which the water 
is projected into the air in a fountain-like 
column. The analogy between geysers and vol- 



Ozarks and Black Sills. 215 

canoes has frequently been noticed and the 
former have often been described as volcanoes 
which erupt heated water instead of melted 
lava. We have italicized the word hot in the 
definition just given, because springs containing 
a large amount of gas may simulate geysers. 

" The difference between geysers and ordinary 
hot springs is not readily explained, nor even 
always recognized. The difference between a 
quiet thermal spring and a geyser in active 
eruption is very marked, but between the two 
there is every grade of action. Some geysers 
appear as quiet springs, as for instance the Grand 
Geyser during its period of quiescence. Others 
might easily be mistaken for constantly boiling 
springs, as in the case of the Giant Geyser, in 
which the water is constantly in active ebulli- 
tion. This is true also of the Strockr of Iceland. 
Many of the springs, therefore, that in the Yel- 
lowstone Park have been "classed as constantly 
boiling springs may be unsuspected geysers. 
The Excelsior Geyser was not discovered to be a 
geyser until eight years after the setting aside 
of the park. Almost all constantly boiling 
springs have periods of increased activity, and 
those which spurt a few feet into the air have 
been classed as pseudo-geysers. 

' * It has been noticed that geysers occur where 
the intensity of volcanic action is decreasing. 
In the neighborhood of active volcanoes, such as 



216 Cave Regioni of the 

"Vesuvius, the temperature appears to be too 
high, and the vapor escapes as steam from what 
are called stufas. When the rocks at the sur- 
face are more cooled the water comes forth in 
liquid form. 

" We will now pass to the various geyser theo- 
ri>;S that have been proposed by different 
writers." 

Dr. Peal then proceeds to give the theories of 
Sir J. Herschell and Sir George McKenzie, but 
as they are accepted and extended by others, 
we may pass on to Bischof 's, of which Dr. Peal 
says : " Very similar to McKenzie's theory is the 
one adopted by Bischof in his Researches on 
the Internal Heat of the Globe (pages 227, 228). 
It is really the theory of Krug Von Nidda, 
who examined the geyser in 1833. Bischof 
says : 

" 'He (Krug Von Nidda) takes it for granted 
that these hot springs derive their temperature 
from the aqueous vapors rising from below. 
When these vapors are able to rise freely in a 
continued column the water at the different 
depths must have a constant temperature equal to 
that at which water would boil under the pressure 
existing at the respective depths ; hence the 
constant ebullition of the permanent springs 
and their boiling heat. If, on the other hand, 
the vapors be prevented by the complicated 
windings of its channels from rising to the sur- 



Ozarks and Black Hills. 217 

face; if, for example, they be arrested in cav- 
erns, the temperature in the upper layers of 
water must necessarily become reduced, because 
a large quantity of it is lost by evaporation at 
the surface, which cannot be replaced from be- 
low. And any circulation of the layers of wa- 
ter at different temperatures, by reason of their 
unequal specific gravities, seems to be very much 
interrupted by the narrowness and sinuousity of 
the passage. The intermitting springs of Ice- 
land are probably caused by the existence of 
caverns, in which the vapor is retained by the 
pressure of the column of water in the channel 
which leads to the surface. Here this vapor 
collects, and presses the water in the cavern 
downward until its elastic force becomes suffi- 
ciently great to effect a passage through the 
column of water which confines it. The violent 
escape of the vapor causes the thunder-like sub- 
terranean sound and the trembling of the earth 
which precedes each eruption. The vapors do 
not appear at the surface until they have heated 
the water to their own temperature. 

"'When so much vapor has escaped that the 
expansive force of that which remains has be- 
come less than the pressure of the confining 
column of v,'ater, tranquility is restored, and 
this lasts until such a quantity of vapor is again 
collected as to produce a fresh eruption. The 
spouting of the spring is therefore repeated at 



218 Cave Regions of the 

intervals, depending on the capacity of the cav- 
ern, the height of the column of water, and the 
heat generated below.' " Dr. Peal continues: 

" Bishof says that the eruptions of the Geyser 
and Strockr agree exactly with this explanation 
and he accounts for the two distinct classes of 
eruption observed in the Geyser as follows : 

" 'The two distinct classes of eruption in the 
geyser which we have already mentioned seem 
to be attributable to two different cavities. A 
small cavity fills quicker, and, therefore, empties 
itself more frequently; a larger one fills slower, 
empties itself seldomer, but with greater vio- 
lence.' " 

Bunsen's theory is the next considered and is 
somewht similar to Bischof's but with notable 
differences. After taking temperatures at 
different points in the Geyser tube his first con- 
clusions are that : 

(1) The temperature in the geyser tube in- 
creases as we descend. 

(2) At no point does the water in the tube 
attain the temperature of ebullition which it 
should have under the pressure to which it is 
subjected, but the temperature depends on the 
time that has elapsed since the last eruption. 
As a great eruption comes near it approaches 
the boiling point. 

(3) At the depth of about forty-five feet the 
difference between the temperature of the water 



OzarM and Black Hills. 216- 

and the calculated boiling point for that pres- 
sure is the least. 

The main point of his theory appears to be 
that an eruption takes place when the water in 
the tube reaches the boiling point, and to ac- 
count for it, "He supposes that the column in 
the central tube communicates by a long and 
sinuous channel with some space, be it what it 
may, which is subjected to the action of the 
direct source of subterranean heat. The tem- 
perature gets raised above the boiling point, 
due to the pressure, and a sudden generation of 
steam is the result. This steam rises in the col- 
umn of water, which, being cooler, causes it to 
condense. Gradually the heat of the water is 
raised until the water of the channel must boil, 
and the steam therefore cannot condense, but 
must accumulate and acquire a gradually in- 
creasing tension. The condensation of the 
bubbles possesses a periodic character, and to 
this is due the uplifting of the water in what 
Bunsen calls conical water hills, which are 
accompanied by the subterranean explosions." 

Prof. Comstock is quoted as thinking "Bun- 
sen's theory has not yet been proved adequate 
to explain the more prominent features of gey- 
ser eruptions. Nor does it, in his opinion, 
account for all the differences between geysers 
and hot springs, and he proposes a structural 



220 Cave Regions of the 

hypothesis which combines Bischof s and Bun- 
sen's theories." 

This hypothesis is illustrated by a figure in 
which a reservoir i)artly filled with water is con- 
nected with the surface by a tube having a 
double curve, and he explains that the water 
collecting in the depressed curve should confine 
the steam, rising from the reservoir in the other 
curve until the pressure is sufiicient to cause an 
eruption. His theory of action being that the 
water in the reservoir remains in equilibrium at 
a certain level, and the constant heat fills the 
space above with vapor, which lieats the water 
held in the downward bend of the tube, and 
that also evolves vapor which fills the balance 
of the tube to the vent. When the combined 
pressure of this vapor and water are overcome 
by the expansion of vapor accumulated above 
the reservoir, they are forced out, and followed 
by a portion of the water of the reservoir. This 
theory is in the report of Captain Jones on 
Northwestern Wyoming. 

The last theory cited by Dr. Peal is that of S. 
Baring-Gould, "Who visited the Iceland geysers 
in 1863, and thinks that a bent tube is sufficient 
to explain the action of the Great Geyser. He 
took an iron tube and bent it in an angle of 110% 
keeping one arm half the lengtii of the other. 
He filled the tube with water and placed tiie 
short arm in the fire. For a moment the surface 



Ozarks and Black Sills. 221 

of the liquid remained quiet, and then the pipe 
began to quiver; a slight overflow took place, 
without any sign of ebullition, and then sudden- 
ly, with a throb, the whole column was forced 
high into the air. With a tube, the long arm 
of which measured two feet and the bore of 
which was three-eighths of an inch, he sent a 
jet to the height of eighteen feet. Steam is 
generated in the short arm and presses down the 
water, causing an overflow until the steam 
bubble tarns the angle, when it forces out the 
column in the long arm with incredible vio- 
lence." 

Dr. Peal now goes on to say : 

" Of the theories that we have just enumera- 
ted, perhaps no one is adequate to explain all 
the phenomena of geyser action. Bunsen's 
theory comes nearest to it, and in the simplest 
kinds of geysers is a sufficient explanation. 
The variations and modifications in the geyser 
tubes and subterranean water passages must 
undoubtedly be important factors entering into 
any complete explanation of geyser action. 
Now, of course, we can see what the conditions 
are at the surface, but in our experiments 
we can penetrate to a very inconsiderable dis- 
tance. We have, therefore, no data to present 
on these points, and investigations of this 
branch of the subject will have to be carried on 
in an artificial manner ; that is artificial geysers 



222 Cave Begions of the 

will have to be constructed, and various modi- 
fications made in the tubes until results are 
reached analogous to those seen in natural gey- 
sers. If water in a glass tube be heated with 
rapidity from the bottom, it will be expelled 
from the tube violently, and if boiled in a ket- 
tle which has a lid and a spout, either the lid 
will be blown off or the water will be forced out 
through the spout. The first ease is an illus- 
tration, in part at least, of Bunsen's theory, 
and the second exemplifies the theories which 
presuppose the existence of subterranean cavi- 
ties with tubes at or near the surface. Accord- 
ing to the former we must suppose that the 
layer of rock, extending seventy-five to 
seventy-seven feet below the surface, contains 
sufficient heat to account for geyseric phenom- 
ena; or else that the geyser tube has some open- 
ing, either at the bottom or on the sides, by 
which steam and superheated water have access 
to it from a considerably greater depth where 
the temperature is very high. At these depths 
caverns probably exist." * * * * 

"That such cavities exist is more than proba- 
ble. On page 405 I have indicated my belief, 
that all geysers are originally due to a violent 
outburst of steam and water, and under such 
conditions, irregular cavities and passages are 
more likely to be formed than regular tubes." * * 

*' In view of what we have just written, Bun- 



Ozarks and Black HilU. 223 

sen's conclusion (No. 2) would have to be mod- 
ified somewhat. His conclusion was that at no 
point in the tube did the water attain the tem- 
perature of ebullition which it should have un- 
der the pressure to which it is subjected. As 
far as this relates to the straight tube in which 
his temperatures were taken, it may be so; but 
if he could have taken temperatures in the side 
conduit, I have little doubt he would soon have 
reached a point where the temperature would 
not only be at the boiling point for that depth 
but even exceed it. In the Yellowstone Park 
we obtained a number of surface temperatures 
which were above the boiling point. In the 
Great Geyser of Iceland, the mass of water in 
the tube prevents this condition at the surface, 
and when it takes p^.ace opposite the aperture 
an eruption is caused. In the main, however, I 
am inclined to accept Bunsen's theory, espe- 
cially as it seems to me to require subterranean 
cavities in which the water must be heated. 
Whether these are caverns, enlargements of 
tubes, or sinus channels, appears to me to be of 
no consequence, except as the interval or period 
of the geyser might be affected by the form of 
the reservoir holding the water." 

Dr. Peal has reached conclusions which pre- 
sent an imaginary picture of the interior struct- 
ure of the great geysers of the Park, that bears 
a striking resemblance to what the two caves of 



224 Cave JRegions of the 

the Black Hills prove to be the true conditions; 
although it is evident he had in mind caverns 
of no such vast extent, nor of so complicated a 
system of cavities and tubes. He overlooked an 
important feature, however, in not accepting 
Professor Comstock's idea of the tube having a 
double curve. The double curve is, or was, 
conspicuous in both the caves. Unfortunately, 
its perfection in Wind Cave was necessarily par- 
tially sacrificed to make the passage traversable 
for visitors; but in describing the enormous 
labor of opening up the cave, Mr. McDonald 
showed how an arching "crawl" had been 
worked down by blasting, and the depression be- 
yond filled to raise it to the desired level for 
securing the present easy passage at the bot- 
tom of the main tube, which is the entrance 
passage. This double curve in the tube is sim- 
ply the rough original of the S trap of sanitary 
plumbing. In both caves it is somewhat irreg- 
ular and deformed, but the familiar "trap" is 
easily recognized. The destruction of one of 
the Yellowstone geysers was, no doubt, 
due to the breaking of the S. One of the many 
reasons for establishing military control over 
the Park is said to have been the disastrous 
results following the introduction of a large 
quantity of soap into the geyser to cause a pre- 
mature eruption. Th3 impatience of the party 
was rewarded by an eruption accompanied by 



Ozarks and Black Hills. 225 

explosions that shook the earth for a great dis- 
tance, and the geyser has nox been seen in ac- 
tion since. 

Dr. Peal finds the theories advanced for the 
generation of steam unsatisfactory and insuffi- 
cient, especially in the class of geysers having 
a long steam period. He says: (page 423) 

" The Castle Geyser differs from Old Faith- 
ful and the Bee Hive mainly in the fact that it 
has a long steam period, during which the 
steam pours out or is pushed from the geyser 
throat with great violence and a terrific 
noise. There appear to be only two possible 
explanations of this difference, viz., either an 
accumulation of immense volumes of steam in 
the Castle, or an instantaneous formation of steam 
throughout the length of the geyser tube. The 
former, to our mind, is untenable, because it 
seems impossible that the water, which is ex- 
hausted in fifteen minutes, should exert enough 
power to keep down the immense amount of 
steam that escapes for more than an hour. Ac- 
cording to Bunsen's theory, it can be readily 
explained. The relief afforded by the first part 
of the eruptions allows the superheated water 
to rise rapidly, and before it can reach the top 
or orifice of the tube it is all converted into 
steam from the top downward with inconceivable 
rapidity, and must be forced out with the terrific 
violence which is noted in the case of the Castle. 



226 Gave Hegions of the 

On page 208 we have expressed the opinion that 
it is the oldest geyser in the region, and it seems 
to us that a greater length in the tube, with a 
consequent greater supply of water, will account 
for the difference between the Castle and Old 
Faithful, the latter of which we consider one of 
the youngest geysers in the Upper Geyser Basin . ' ' 
A study of the Caves in connection with the 
active Geysers indicates that the theory he sug- 
gests and then rejects, is probably the true 
explanation of the difference between the two 
kinds of geysers. It seems that the length of 
the tube must necessarily have more effect on 
the height of the jet than on the generation of 
steam ; as after an eruption the tube is hotter 
than at any other time and therefore the gener- 
ation of steam in it should be less than usual, 
unless the fresh inflow of water was cold. Then 
if the storage cavities are broad but low, the 
steam cannot accumulate above the water; but 
when the pressure becomes sufficient to force a 
passage through the tube, the water and steam 
are expelled together until the j)ressure is 
exhausted. But if the storage chambers are 
vertical fissures, as Wind Cave illustrates, vast 
quantities of steam must accumulate above the 
water level in the main reservoirs before the 
pressure can become sufficient to expel the 
water in the tube, after which steam alone 
continues to rush out until the pressure is so 



Ozarks and Black Hills. 227 

relieved that it can no longer force a passage 
through the water remaining in the trap, when 
quiet is restored. By the constant addition of 
fresh water from the surface, by percolation or 
other usual ways of sinking, the necessary con- 
ditions for the generation of steam are main- 
tained with surprising regularity. 

The differences in the shape and general 
arrangement of the cavities and tubes of the 
two caves, indicate that their action as geysers 
was very unlike. Wind Cave evidently sent a 
rather slender column to a great height, nearly 
perpendicular, and the water eruption was 
followed by a long steam period. Crystal Cave 
ejected a much larger jet more frequently, at a 
low angle of inclination, the eruption was sooner 
over, and was not followed by a steam period of 
any consequence. 

Thus it can be seen that the caves of the Black 
Hills prove the theories in regard to geyser 
action in Yellowstone Park, and those theories, 
in turn, prove the past history of the caves. The 
study of geyser action also shows that the coni- 
cal or dome shape of some of the cave chambers 
is not due to the whirl of incoming floods, as in 
other regions, but to jets of water forced up 
from lower levels. 

Perhaps the finest geyser basin, and possible 
cave, ever in existence was destroyed when the 
Grand Canon of the Yellowstone became a canon. 



228 Cave Regions. 

Evidences of the former conditions in control of 
this gorgeously brilliant scene are neither want- 
ing nor doubtful. Steam constantly issues from 
numerous small vents in the cafion walls, and a 
field glass reveals miniature geysers in action 
down in the depth of the canon, nearly half a 
mile below the top of the wall; while the entire 
canon shows, in both the color and character of 
its rocks, that chemical agencies have wrought 
changes here that have not been effected in other 
exposures of similar nature. It seems not im- 
probable that the relation of Yellowstone River 
to the Grand Canon was the same as, at the 
present time, is thatof the Firehole to the Upper, 
Middle, and Lower Geyser Basins: and that an 
explosion of great force was followed by a gen 
eral collapse instead of the usual eruption of 
one of the grandest geysers; one result being the 
sudden precipitation of the river into a new, 
beautiful, and totally unexpected channel. 
After its great leap of tw^o hundred and ninety- 
seven* feet at the Lower Fall, the river flows in 
a brilliant, narrow line of emerald green, broken 
by the white foam of frequent cascades, between 
magnificent walls of yellow, white, pink, and 
red of most vivid hues. 

♦Measurement by the Hayden Party. 

THE END. 



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